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According to WikiAnswers, about 150,000 people die every day on this planet. On June 25, Michael Jackson, a talented but troubled star, was one of them. If I tell you that, honestly, I don't care any more about his death than the other 149,999 others, does that make me a bad person?
I understand that Jackson's death is a notable news occurance, as the deaths of famous people often are. But what is really added to the conversation by the 10,000th bad interview with someone who knew him tangentially? How is our understanding of the world deepened by yet another 10 minutes of inane, uninformed blather and speculation about which drugs the man may or may not have ingested? And aren't these solemn "memorials" to Jackson all over my teevee in somewhat poor taste, considering that whether or not the old pervert was convicted of any crimes, he freely admitted having strangers kids sleep in his bed? I mean, isn't there a disconnect there?
No, I don't mourn the man. I never met him. People seem to think because he peers out at them from their CD rack, and because they've seen a lot of footage of him in courtrooms on their teevee, they have a personal relationship with the man. Well, I see James Carville and Wolf Blitzer a lot, too, and I don't feel much of a relationship with them, either.
On the other hand, I remember being really moved when Johnny Cash died. And I never met him, either. But I was moved by the story about the loss of his wife, June Carter, and the way he threw himself into recording new material in the last few months of his life. It never occurred to me, though, to drive down to the hospital and stand vigil for the man, or to build a maudlin online memorial. For the life of me, I can't understand what that would have added to the Universe.
After all, the day he died, 149,999 other people also passed on, and I probably met at least a few of them.
4 comments:
Only 150,000 people die everyday? Shit. Seems kinda meager when you put it like that. I think what this planet needs in an enema.
-The Grim Reaper
Here some comments I liked in regards to Michael Jackson and the media – from the Australian Crikey website. Sorry - it's a long post - but every email I try to send sits in the outbox for days. Something is wrong with our email.
It’s not quite clear when the Michael Jackson coverage became simply ridiculous -- probably when Uri Geller, calling in from what Python called his Institute of Advanced Spoon Bending, was appearing simultaneously on multiple global cable news networks.
It’s easy to point out the contrast between the depth afforded the simple fact of one entertainer’s death and issues of actual real-world consequence -- but much harder to explain. Despite the media cycle now being so rapid there is little chance of any complex and significant issue being adequately addressed by the mainstream media, occasionally it slips a gear into a frenetic but motionless consumption and regurgitation of the same banal and unchanging facts. All perspective and sense of the relative newsworthiness of the event is abandoned in favour of ill-informed, irrelevant opinion, and opinions about that opinion.
The media would doubtless argue that it is merely reflecting the needs of its consumers, like any business. But unlike other industries, the media is in the privileged position of having a critical role in shaping the perceived needs of its audience. It does not have to slavishly follow the flawed mindset of some of its consumers, and indeed frequently makes a judgement not to do so. Why here? An appropriate relegation of Jackson’s death to the celebrity section while meaningful events -- say, the slaughter in Iran -- are given more detailed coverage might be too much to ask, but a re-balancing of news values toward issues that actually affect us would not go astray.
It seems to me that the 150,000 number must be too low. It would take millions of years for the population now on earth to die off.
Divide 6 billion by 150,000
Divide 6 billion by 75 (average lifespan?). Divide that by 365, and you get 219,178. Given that the world's population skews to the younger end of the scales, 150,000 sounds about right.
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