On Needing Analysis

I've been worried about myself this week.  A little worried about how indifferent I've become to hearing horrifying news.  I'm too used to clicking over to Yahoo throughout the day and reading headlines like, "150 killed in Baghdad explosion" right underneath, "Will Sanjaya Whatshisface get the boot tonight?"

Just checked Yahoo.

"Iraqis bury victims from deadly attacks"
"Lisa Rinna to replace Joan Rivers on red carpet"

And then I think,  God, Iraq is hell on earth.  Didn't know Joan Rivers was still around.  Then I click away.

On Monday, when I saw the headline about the shootings at Virginia Tech, I thought about it the same way.  Which is to say, I didn't think about it all that much.  I don't remember what non-story was also included in the list of headlines.  Probably something about John Edwards getting a haircut.

Oh God, another horrifying school shooting.  John Edwards is so young looking.  Wonder how his wife's doing?

Click.

When I turned on MSNBC Monday night, Tucker Carlson was asking one of the VA Tech students something like, "I know this is just pure speculation, but why do you think he did this?"  And I thought, what kind of question is that? And then I thought, this kid is probably in shock, stop asking him stupid questions.  And then I thought, I hate cable news.  And then I turned the TV off and started reading Anne Lamott's new book, Grace (Eventually).

Click.

Why am I so indifferent to tragedy lately?  I can't figure out if I'm getting too much information or not enough.  I'm either getting too many meaningless sound bites or too much psychobabble.  And because of that combination, I'm just checking out.  But, I finally read something this morning that gives me a glimmer of hope that maybe my heart is not entirely turning to stone.

Nancy Nall:

I don’t know what’s happening to me, but it seems like the bad news of any given day can always be made worse by the coverage of the bad news. I turned on CNN in search of a succinct here’s-what-we-know summation, and found Paula Zahn wondering “what sort of counseling students will need” to process their feelings. On the blogs, the usual yapping about guns — hey, let’s arm everyone! Then this will never happen again! (Advice: Move to Detroit, where that’s pretty much the case, and see how well it works. A woman shot at the tires of a truck she thought was tailgating her, and recently said she thought it was entirely justified.)

I’m confining my reading on this story to one or two excellent newspapers. I solemnly promise to avert my eyes from any chin-scratching columnists seeking to explain it all to me, to keep the TV turned off, to change to the hip-hop station if I hear Daniel Schorr rumbling to life on the subject on NPR. On this story as on no other, all I want are facts. I’ll handle my own analysis.

You want to know who finally said something last night that made me feel human again? Jon Stewart, genius. He launched his show by saying something about the day’s awful events, not frowning, just speaking honestly. And then he said something like, “But I’m not going to dwell on this tonight. I’m going to do what I always do. I’m going to repress it, try to forget about it, not think of it at all. And then, in 40 years, someone’s going to spill some juice, and I will explode.” How deft. Acknowledgment, rueful joke, sidestep, and not a patronizing note in the whole thing.

...all I want are facts. I’ll handle my own analysis.  Yep, just the facts would be great.  And I completely understand Nancy's thought on feeling human again because of Jon Stewart's quote.  And not to nitpick Nancy Nall, but here's the actual quote:

Today is a horrible, horrible day. I have absolutely nothing to add that is insightful or anything. I will just do what I always do when faced with something that is that powerfully damaging to the emotional core: I will begin to repress it and I will swallow it and I imagine that thirty years from now someone will spill juice and I will freak the fuck out. - Jon Stewart, 04/16/07

How deft is right.  It's the best thing I read all week.

I'm so tired of meaningless sound bites and everyone's psychobabble.  I need to find out which one or two excellent newspapers will provide me with the facts I need so I can handle my own analysis. Or someone's going to force me to go in for analysis when that juice is spilled 30 years from now.

Comments

[Claire]

I understand what you mean about all of this. The sound bites totally make everything worse, confusing it all. Although Jon Stewart always strikes the right cord, doesn't he?

I haven't been reading too much about VA Tech, but it scared the hell out of me. I think I'm still too close to my undergrad days.

[Kevin Wolf]

There ain't nothing wrong with you, BG.

Here's my thing: Months ago (nine, maybe) I dumped my cable TV and do not have any reception for broadcast TV. I don't miss it.

The idea that you need access to these channels when "something important" is happening is erroneous - especially when one has access to the internet.

I review Google news, read a few articles and - click - skip the ones that start heading into psychobabble and "analysis" of things they know nothing about. I read as much as I can handle at a given moment so as not to get overwhelmed; so as not to hit a wall and start feeling nothing.

That way, my choice is not between feeling nothing and "feeling" for victims of death whoever and wherever they may be. I can just feel things out for myself without all the mediation.

[Adorable Girlfriend]

AG is similar to Kevin. The best advice is:

What were you thinking: Tuckbag?!! Gaaackkkk.

And

Fox News: shoot your TV!!!

[Larry Jones]

Except for the kids at the school this the simplest, most human reaction I've seen or read. Thank you.

[Nicho]

It all falls back on the Eddie Murphy joke, which I 'm going to paraphrase and pretend he wasn't talking about sex: "Give a starving man a cracker and he'll think it's the best tasting cracking he ever put in his mouth. But after a while, it becomes the same old cracker."

Get away from your standard news gathering practices and start fresh. Turn off the TV because YouTube captures the best stuff anyway, for good or ill. The media conglomerates out there have all sold their souls so there's really nothing they hold sacred anymore, anyway. They're not interested in giving you the news - they want to sell you something. Whether or not you get the facts doesn't matter so long as you're mesmerized when they utter the phrase, "the following video is considered graphic and young children shouldn't be watching." You can almost hear a collective VOL UP button being pressed at once followed shortly thereafter by TiVo blips and beeps.

When things fall out of perspective we're actually quite well equipped to realize it, or you wouldn't have posted this. The trick is to do something completely out of the ordinary routine to remind ourselves that we're alive. Sometimes it's as simple as going out for ice cream or can be as elaborate as standing on top of your roof to see the neighbor's lawn from a different perspective.

[Jennifer]

I think all of the talking heads diminish the impact of any event. I watched some of their coverage and it was so off the mark. It was grasping, it was desperate, it was nothing but a disservice. This was one event where I just needed to feel and not listen.

[Ranger]

So much of the national reaction seems to be running away from the black hole we all bear inside ourselves. I assert we're all capable of snapping. The only question is why this guy headed in to psycho country when he snapped? I thought we left high school behind. We all learned our lessons and moved on. Not so. Ok, so let's all get guns and descend in to the "nasty, brutish and short" state. Wait, that doesn't sound good. How 'bout we all sing Koom-b'ayah? Really, I think we could do worse than just sing Koom-b'ayah. All, I got. -DFW

[Scorpio]

I called my reaction "frozen" -- it was about nonexistent. That is worrisome. I'm not glad you felt that way too, I just commiserate.

It is awful when slaughter gets no reaction. Outrage burnout. Dead everywhere.

[Scorpio]

I called my reaction "frozen" -- it was about nonexistent. That is worrisome. I'm not glad you felt that way too, I just commiserate.

It is awful when slaughter gets no reaction. Outrage burnout. Dead everywhere.

[Larry Jones]

The missing word that should have been in my comment above is "is."

I hate to leave loose ends.

[cobalt_00]

I agree with a lot of the folk who have already posted. But I think there's a difference between not reacting and not caring. You are still having moments when you think, "Iraq is hell on earth." You may not be falling apart but you're still being empathetic.

[The Viscount]

Yeah...

[almostinfamous]

there is a facebook group that was just started by one of my friends that says

iraq = v.tech x 2 x 365 x 4

just for scale.

to me, the virginia tech shootings indicate not much more than that our lives are all but a split second away from death, and will continue to be despite any measures of so-called safety that we institute except walling oneself off from the outside world completely.

[almostinfamous]

there is a facebook group that was just started by one of my friends that says

iraq = v.tech x 2 x 365 x 4

just for scale.

to me, the virginia tech shootings indicate not much more than that our lives are all but a split second away from death, and will continue to be despite any measures of so-called safety that we institute except walling oneself off from the outside world completely.

[BOSSY]

Leave it up to Bossy's husband Jon Stewart to encapsulate a feeling.

[Brando]

You know, after reading the news today (oh boy), I still went and checked my fantasy baseball stats. I don't feel that makes me indifferent or unfeeling. I have times when I'm moved and time when I'm detached. You can't live in a constant state of outrage or fear or anger or any extreme emotion. It's unhealthy. Like cobalt said, there's a difference between not reacting and not caring.

[Chuckles]

Well, along with all this, Blue Girl's title was shortened in the URL to "On Needing Anal" and even with everything else that is happening that title has cracked me up.

[b tween]

Back when there were 3 major networks and each metro area had a few local (vhf/uhf) channels, the network news covered the nation and world, while the locals pacticed "if it bleeds it leads" local journalism.

Morning, afternoon and evening news. 3 hours of stories a day was all it took. There was plenty of high quality stuff to fill that time.

But today we have literally hundreds of competing constantly rurnning outlets. Newspapers channels, many websites, blogs and so on.

They collectively represent hundreds of hours of "space" a day that need to be filled with content that keeps you coming back. Headline News wants you to leave your TV tuned to Headline News, so the stories must necessarily evolve during the day.

This means if nothing is happening, they have to make the news happen. They do this by turning sweet nothings into BREAKING NEWS! ANNA NICOLE BABY-DADDY crap, thus creating a process that feeds upon itself, and the "analysis" bits are really just broadcast time (k/f)illers.

The gatekeepers of news had to open the gates all the way to keep advertisers coming.

So, the big consequence of all this is precisely what you, BG and so many others are feeling (self included).

We've become inured to the real stuff because the constant hum of NJ GRANNY DIES OF NATURAL CAUSES! stuff overwhelms us.

When you live next to a church, you stop hearing the bells after a while.

I read the Financial Times (best America/World politics and news coverage out there), and two locals. The 10 o'clock news goes off after the first 15 minutes, and the Daily Show/Colbert pair come on at 11.

Who needs anything else?

[Neddie Jingo]

Yeah, good ol' Web 2.0 sure does make for some tasteless juxtapositions, doesn't it...

I happen to be the lead UI designer for, oh, let's say a major-ish portal. You've heard of it.

We had a hotshot creative director who took it into his head that we should present not one major news story at a time in a feed-driven rotating module, but three. "Think how compelling! Think how fabulous! Think how Web 2.0!"

OK, punk-ass, said your Neddie. Let's examine a real-world application, shall we?

I did a mockup with his three juxtaposed news stories, picked from the Web:

Bloodshed Continues in Iraq: 45 Dead in Car-Bomb Exposion

Top Science Body Says Global Warming Is Real

Shopping Essentials: The Little Black Dress

How many little black dresses will get sold in that company?

Hotshot Boy backed down pretty quick.

[craig johnson]

Hey Blue Girl...this comment of mine doesn't make a great deal of sense but I think it's a call for help when a tragedy occurs and cable news goes spewy-wacky.

"Vermont Farmers versus Pharma Mutation"
America is a nation of histrionics; adjective, adverb and noun.
With all the crap Americans digest to pharma-mutate their brains (and bodies), some one should come out with a "Vermont Farmer" brand laconic pill.
Chill out! Spartan up! These might be catchy ad phrases.
Perhaps "Dirty Harry" for a spokesman. Who else comes to mind?
--cognitorex--

[Res Publica]

Great post....REALLY great. Nancy also nailed it. I have developed an almost visceral revulsion toward even relatively politically-neutral journalists (rare enough) and their village idiot patter.

Cocktails, my place, 8 PM. In lieu of olives, we'll be garnishing our martinis with pills!