Georgian Luge Crash

[supersuk]

its ok to watch saddam die on tv

[Duncan]

well, not sure if admirable is the right word... not like it'd take a huge effort on their part to apologize...

[nature boy]

for some people it's a huge effort to apologize. i think even more so for large corporations. no one likes to admit that they're wrong, especially those with all this pride and stuff.

[Duncan]

yea, but i don't think it's admirable to be like oh, we screwed up, but admire us because we screwed up but we're telling you that we screwed up...

and i think it's pretty easy for a corp to apologise in this situation because everyone and their mother knows that they were wrong... admitting something that everyone including yourself knows isn't very hard in a situation like this...

if they broadcast a political piece with their own agenda and there was an outrage about it, then it would be admirable if they apologized because they went out and did something wrong for selfish gain to begin with.

[joel]

hmm...

I can understand why people are upset about the video. As it is upsetting to watch anyone lose their life. But on the other hand, as reporters/broadcasters it's supposed to be their job to provide people with a (hopefully) unbiased presentation of facts, which I think included this video. People wanted to know what happened in this incident as evidence by even level of interest in this thread topic.

I'll admit that if I were a family member of the athelete I may be outraged with the feed and those responsible for airing it. But that doesn't necessarily mean it was wrong of them. It depends on their intention, was it for profit or was it to bring greater awareness of dangers of the sport and perhaps shock enough people so that changes are made to make the sport (or particular track) safer for all...

It was news... and they treated it as such. I hope they at least added a disclaimer before airing though, as it is graphic and unsuitable for children.

[[JT]]

im gonna have to agree with Joel. News is News. Apologize? Sure, why not? It's easy for newscasts to issue a simple apology after to diffuse some of the complaining. The ratings are already in the bag.

You cant blame CTV for doing their job. Imagine if they didn't air it. Viewership would flock to NBC because they have the most detailed coverage of this tragic event.

And no, this cannot be compared to a snuff film because snuff films are for people that are wacking off to that kind of sick s***t.

[nature boy]

[se7entse7en]

IMO
I feel that reporting it is one thing, but repeatedly showing it on National tv is another, just as I don't believe showing clips of terrorists beheading hostages should be shown on tv. Report it, tell us about it, but there's no need to show us the the bloody, gory details.

A little boobslip gets censored, but showing a guy die is fine? Not to me.

I don't blame CTV for it though. I'm sure they were in as much shock as I was regarding the incident, but in hindsight, a little more tact would have been nice.

[joel]

[nature boy]

that's where i'll really disagree.

sure, haiti was a bad thing, all the natural disasters are. but what about the marginalized who die everyday in our own home town? how about those suffering from mental illness in the downtown eastside? how about the fact that KAIROS got all its funding cut from the government? how about the fact that brian heinrich has been basically working for nothing for the past while? no one seems to care enough about that stuff to put it on the news. is it because it's not newsworthy? or is it because it's not ratings-worthy?

the media has played up these events (like haiti) and as a result allow people to "feel good" after contributing a couple bucks. they think that they did something to help the worst event in recent history when there are huge atrocities happening everyday right under our very own noses. the same happened with the tsunami in india a few years ago. the media jumped on it because it looked like the "humanitarian" thing to do, but all the while more people die in africa from aids and starvation than the tsunami killed. but no one wants to contribute a couple bucks to educate those people on the dangers of aids and how to maintain proper healthcare.

even the olympics is all hype. i heard that it costs 6 billion us dollars to ensure that every child on earth has a decent education. so do we spend it? no, we throw half of that into an event that really doesn't do anything in the long run to better our world. i don't get why something like the olympics causes such a hype when it has nothing to do with anyone except the athletes and their families (except that our tax dollars paid for it).

oh wait, yeah i do. the media hyped it up to make it seem like something bigger than it really is.

[[JT]]

[geForce]

I think CTV's bottom line is ratings and money. Yes, they achieve ratings and money through news, and yes, they hold true to the fact their news is as unbiased as they possibly can. However, they don't claim to be emotionally sensitive or responsible to any of the parties involved.

The fact is, any news that they report is demand generated. People WANT to see the video footage of the crash, so they give the people what they want. You can't imagine how many people have googled or searched youtube to try to find a video footage of the crash. They're trying to capitalize on that because that's the type of news that people want to see.

On the other hand, they rescinded the video due to political pressure from the IOC and probably the Canadian government. They have exclusive Canadian broadcast rights for the Olympics, so they're probably really trying to walk on eggshells here in order to not incur any Olympic coverage bans in the future.

Seriously though, how many times have we seen people die on TV? Like, a comparable video would be the Robert Dziekanski death by taser video. How many times did that show on TV?

On a related note.. the local Chinese TV station broadcasted the luge crash video last night. That was pretty risky of them, since I'm pretty sure CTV didn't give them any rights to do so.

[nature boy]

[joel]

I think there a lot of great points have been put out there. there are a lot of troubling newsworthy happenings that are occurring out there. some of it which do make it on to the news and of course logistically some of it does not, for tonnes of different reasons. it still up to the viewer themselves to prioritize what of it is important to take for themselves.

my main point which may have seemed to be misunderstood is that information "in this case in the form of video footage" should not be purposefully censored as it adds value to the telling events of this story. just as video footage of those suffering from mental illness downtown eastside would for a story about them. That viewers can more truly be impacted by events when they see them occur with their own eyes rather than just hear of its occurance. And that's part of what I see as what makes up a good news report.

Their choice of what stories to focus on is not what i am arguing, just how they do it. Do they withold information from the public, or do they give us everything and so our reactions are based on all the information.

[nature boy]

i can see joel's point, but i don't know if it's necessary to show death to make it any more of a death to people. if anything, it seemed sensationalized to me. the image of his lifeless body will remain in our minds for a long time (if it ever fades) but who even remembers his name?

my point is that they're not going for factual accuracy as much as they're going for effect (which leads to ratings). i admit, i wanted to see it when i heard that there was video footage, which is just to show us that we are left wanting more blood, more gore and more explicitness, but that doesn't mean that it's right.