The Tragedy of the Newspaper
When I was in school, I used to read the newspaper every day. Though I did not understand most of the issues I made sure that I at least skimmed through the headlines. The only exception to this was the ‘sports’ page which always had a special reservation. Though I lost the habit during college and lived the – I don’t care about the world – typical of college my aspirations brought me to the newspaper and has been reading them quite studiously for the last two years.
But I have to admit investigating the newspaper beyond a point clearly reveals that the world is definitely not a nice place to ‘live’. Newspapers have such a strong affinity for negativity that reports and analysis mostly portray or relay news which are unhappy happenings. At one point one can’t stop thinking that the whole world is ‘moronic’.
Photo Courtesy: Jon S
Corruption cases which drag on for years, an ill-equipped law and administrative system, killings in the name of honour, recommendations from committees which never get implemented, judicial proceedings which sometimes are pathetic, politicians concerned on what should people eat rather than education and healthcare, world leaders who do nothing about climate change, international affairs run based on the whims and aspirations of a specific set of countries and trust me the list is exhaustive and it gets repeated every day.
The irony is that not all people I know are ‘moronic’ as the newspaper portrays the entire world to be. If going by the newspaper that everything in the world is just wrong, it is certainly not reflecting what the real world is. And promising to be a window of the globe why do newspapers betray their responsibility? Well, one can argue that there are nice things like either a new hit album from Beyonce and the century by Virat Kohli on the last two pages or the ‘lifestyle’ supplements which talk about everything ‘nice’ about human life.
Photo Courtesy: (Mick Baker)rooster
But my point is, how can everything concerning administration, law and order, governance, and policy all wrong and only the lifestyle pages be right? Maybe newspapers have got their formula wrong or maybe they don’t carry a very important disclaimer.
A bus which runs its lifetime without an accident never makes the front page. If newspapers are really serious about ‘windows to the world’ they better carry a disclaimer which reads on the front page: “Apart from the shortcomings reported in this paper, it can be hoped that everything went normal”. Maybe that would give good reasons to people like me not to open a day’s newspaper fearing another dosage of sadness and badness. Editors should seriously think about this, well maybe I should write a letter to all editors. I will consider that.
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(1)Jon S
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