Give Us Dirty Laundry

One of my friends on Facebook shared a photo last night. I looked at the photo, read the name, but didn't recognize it, and scrolled on to play my next level of "Candy Crush" Then this morning, another friend of mine posted this status, Maybe one day a person who saves countless children's lives will get as much attention and recognition as a person who takes them. Why is the media negative? Because that's what we tell them we want. It made me think of the Don Henley song, "Dirty Laundry" 


We got the bubble-headed bleached blond comes on at 5,
She can tell you 'bout the plane crash with a gleam in her eye,
It's interesting when people die,
Give us dirty laundry.
We have become a society who crave tragedy! We relish in celebrities woes! We want that dirty laundry! Now, before people get offended, I am not pointing fingers at anyone in particular, and when I say "we", I am not actually accusing anyone who reads this of being a ravenous wolf salivating at the prospect of seeing death, destruction and mayhem. I am merely making an observation. Case in point: Let's go back to the picture I mentioned above. The photo shared was that of Antoinette Tuff. For those of you who do not know who that is, she is the bookkeeper, yes, you read that right, the bookkeeper who talked an armed gunman into surrendering his weapons at an Atlanta Elementary school yesterday. The result? Over 800 students, an undisclosed number of staff, police officers on the scene, and even the shooter walked away from the scene without a scratch! I had to do a google search for "Georgia Elementary School" to find her name and the story. Of the 14 hits that came up on the first page, only 2 talk about Antoinette. The others are about the gunman, the AK47, and the shots fired. I saw nothing on Facebook when this was unfolding except one mention of a gunman at a Georgia Elementary School, and then nothing else until my friend shared Antoinette's photo last night. I have two local news station that come up in my news feed. Obviously, once it was over, and no one was hurt, I'm guessing, the story didn't make the cut for the teaser to go to the news station's website or watch the evening's broadcast. No, Antoinette's heroism and bravery were trumped by the three psychopath assholes who killed a jogger because they were bored. We read of the stories of the gladiators fighting to the death and feeding people to live animals while 1000's cheered, and we think it disgusting and vile and uncivilized, but is today's media frenzy obsessed with death and destruction really that different? And if we stopped watching, and turned it off, and stopped sharing it through social media, wouldn't they stop? I caught myself today. The story of the jogger killed came up on my news feed, and I got ready to share it on my timeline with my proclamation of my shock and disgust, and I stopped myself. I'm going to try very hard from this day forward to share good news. Does that mean I won't speak out against injustice? NO! But it does mean that I will stop and think before I hit that share button what and why I'm actually sharing.