Media and Mis-reporting the Facts of Tragedy

Recently two major tragedies occurred, and because each media outlet wanted to be the first to report the "big story", there were many inaccuracies and misreports. The first tragedy was the death of Washington Redskins safety Sean Taylor in his Miami home early last week. The second tragedy occurred today, when a man went into a department store in a mall and ended up killing 8 people and himself. It is extremely upsetting when reporters feel the need to report a story prematurely, before finding out all the facts, and upset their audience or make a tragedy seem much larger or smaller than it actually is.

As I was reading this weeks edition of Sports Illustrated Magazine, I came across an extremely interesting article about the misreporting that occurred surrounding Sean Taylor's death. Early in the morning on Monday November 26th, 4 young men planned to rob his home in Miami, FL, not knowing that anyone was home. As he and his wife heard noise outside of their bedroom, Sean grabbed a machete he hid under his bed and went to go investigate what was happening in his home, but he never made it out of the door of the bedroom. He was shot in the leg, which cut his femoral artery and by time paramedics arrived he had lost too much blood. Doctors did everything they could to save him but on the following morning, he passed away. In the days after the shooting, many media outlets began to report about Taylor's past, which had multiple run-ins with both NFL officials and police. However, his friends had reported that he was a changed man. Still, many in the media felt the need to taint his name and report that the shooting most likely had to do with the fact that he was a "thug", a stereotype usually associated with young, African American men. This idea upset many people who knew Sean Taylor, since they were close to him and the media wasn't. We have since learned that Taylor's past had absolutely nothing to do with the robbery, it was his wealth.

Today, as I was watching the 24-hour news channels, I saw reports of the shootings in the Westroads mall in Omaha, NE. As I watched, the reporters began to think about what could have caused the shootings, whether it was a domestic dispute or a disgruntled employee who had recently been fired. I know that the media's role in any tragedy is to begin to interpret the events so the audience has a feeling of comfort, but in my mind I tend to think: wouldn't it be better if reporters decided to wait for all the facts so they can provide their audience with an accurate story? As of the most recent reports, we have learned that the shooter was a young, emotional man who wanted to commit suicide and as he wrote in a suicide note "he wanted to go out in style". However, the media had many different reports regarding the shooter. First, police were still searching for him. Next, the police had a man in custody who they believed was the shooter but ended up not being the shooter. Finally, they figured out that it was a suicide. This information is misleading to the audience and this can be extremely dangerous.

I just hope that in the future, reporters make sure not to make any reports that either taint a victims name or that could put some body's life in danger if that are incorrectly accused of committing a crime.