...on second thought, not the best idea I've ever had...
While I'm musing over Journalism's animal change, let me share a quote by Finley P. Dunne.
"Comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable."
Now, before you start getting onto me about reporter stereotypes (You know, those people who try to ruin everybody else's lives), let me explain. I'm not saying that journalists should find a happy middle class family with 4 kids and a dog and try to ruin their lives. That is just cruel.
I'm also not saying that journalists should search the lives of public figures and try to ruin theirs. (Dear Journalists, President Clinton was a decent president-- was his personal life important? Same goes for Mark Sanford.)
Instead, I think that journalists should be there to assist the world in becoming smaller. No, I don't mean dig a bunch of holes and send the dirt into space.
Every morning, people sit at their tables, eat their breakfast and read the newspaper. When they are done, do they feel sorry for their neighbors in North Korea who are starving, or their friends across the pond who are feeling the economic impacts of BP's fall from grace.
They probably aren't.
But I think we can fix that!
We should be the Watchdogs (or watchducks) of our society. We should be the windows to the world. We should make this world a little bit smaller everyday. We can do that, you know. We just have to try.
We just have to care.
With all of Folly's Frivolities,
Allison Goett
P.S. I know you are waiting for it.
Great post! I too was a little caught off guard by the "comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable" quote. It seems like the last thing I want to do is make a story out of nothing just to afflict the comfortable. But as I thought about it more, it actually does make sense. I like where you went with it though. I agree that it is important for journalists to make the world smaller. How else is the public going to stay informed?
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