aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
They can’t help themselves
I just finished listening to Diane Sawyer arguing with Barry Sheck that the media was reasonably following where the story led.
Lemmings.
What is amazing to me is the media circus that has followed this “case” for almost two weeks now without really a shred of proof that anything had truly developed in the 10-year-old mystery. And we’re not just talking about an informational mention on page six or seven of the local newspaper, or a 90-second story buried in the second half of a one-hour newscast.
We’re talking about hour upon hour of coverage, with some cable news networks devoting the entire hour of a 60-minute newscast to a developing story that could very well have turned out to be a lot of noise about nothing. We’re talking about alleged journalists and editors whose judgment made them decide that John Mark Karr’s plane ride from Thailand to the United States, where he sat, who he talked to, what he ate and even what procedure was used to allow him to use the bathroom was their very top story.
All of this without the most basic elements of proof that freshman journalism students taking Reporting 100 are taught to look for.
Via Romenesko.
