A television reporter tracked down the people involved, turned on a camera, stuck a microphone in their faces. There was the aggrieved family on the tube, telling an audience their woes. Minutes before, on the same station, there had been footage of human beings pulled from rubble in India, the story of two murdered professors in Dartmouth, the usual mayhem of life in the city and the news that Cardinal Law was being sued for allowing a priest he knew had molested boys to continue working with children. Thousands more injured. A community in shock over the deaths of a beloved couple, and a cardinal accused of choosing to protect a priest at the expense of children.
TV has hours to fill, too many hours.
So TV fills up the time. The trivial shares space with the tragic. Both come into the brain in the same weighted tones. Disaster and discomfort get the same treatment. On a radio station two weeks ago what was promoted as straight news, an interview between a reporter and the mayor, morphed into a confrontation.