News or Hypothesis? An Opinion cont from pg 23.....
Today the media has a more difficult problem; the sheer volume of news that is needed to feed 24 hour rolling TV and radio news broadcasting. This may well be causing major changes in what is perceived as news (my hypothesis). This includes the idea that “public opinions” (as opposed to ‘public opinion’) on events is as newsworthy as the facts of the events themselves and the development of a “caste of celebrities” ranging from the more traditional royals, politicians, explorers, artists, performers, sportspeople etc. to the “nouveau celebrities” who may be the family or friends of the more traditional group but includes people who are famous for being famous and their entourage.
A more corrosive development is the expanding definition of “public interest”. As an individual member of the public, I may have a measure of vicarious and even prurient interest in the activities of some “celebrities” but I do not consider that to be the same as “public interest” and therefore it should fall into the realm of “gossip” rather than “news”. Why on earth does the decision for Hollywood star, Gwyneth Paltrow to “consciously uncouple” from Chris Martin, front man for the band ‘Coldplay’ warrant headline status?
Much of what we see and hear in the media today is, in my view, gossip rather than news and this includes much of what has been published about MH 370. There are potential repercussions for irresponsible reporting including misplaced religious hatred if people react to allegations of terrorist atrocity.
Some news items scream “totally irresponsible press incompetence” According to a South African survey (DDI), the people on 6.2 million social media platforms on social media are 8 times more likely to refer to Oscar Pistorius as guilty (8.43 per cent) than innocent (1.14 percent). I had to read this item twice before I could believe the staggering ineptitude of this report and the deplorable and selective use of the statistics leaping from the page. If approximately 8 people in every hundred think he is guilty and approximately 1 in every hundred think he is innocent then approximately 90.5 do not think of him as innocent or guilty.
To conclude, I hope that we will discover the whole truth about Flight MH 370 rather than arrive at some conclusion based on surmise unsupported by actual event based fact. A trawl of the media over the past weeks suggests that the weight of opinion points the finger at the pilot. He may share a religion and the name Ahmad with the Mahdi who led the forces that killed and, against his express orders, beheaded General Gordon, but I prefer evidence to ill-founded supposition based on prejudice.
Footnote - The Mahdi only survived Gordon by months as he died of Typhus in June 1885. When Sir Herbert Kitchener defeated the Mahdist forces in 1898, he destroyed the tomb of Mahdi, Muhammad to prevent it becoming a rallying point for his supporters having his bones thrown into the Nile. Kitchener retained Ahmad’s skull and it is thought that it may have been buried later at Wadi Haifa.