Over the past few days, the public -- through the media and the Internet -- have continued to criticize the delays that led to the Pachang Creek
The frightening pictures broadcast nationwide on TV inspired compassion or rage over the incident that need to be released through the public media or the Internet.
Trying to find something positive from the tragedy, we could say that because of the TV coverage of the incident, the entire nation had a chance to experience the pain and helplessness of the four victims -- as if we were there in the muddy water with them.
This awakened the public to the problems inherent in Taiwan's emergency rescue system. This is perhaps one of the best excuses for the media to abuse its SNG (Satellite News Gathering) broadcast capabilities.
If we take a negative view of the situation, we could say that the only function of live news broadcasts nowadays are to make the audience feel as if they are actually there, participating in the scene.
French scholar Paul Virilio once said that the modern technology of live telecommunication has created "telepresence" -- the illusion that the viewer is personally at the site. As a result, the media now tends to go for more controversial or even shocking news in order to keep their audience watching.
Media scholar Marshall MacLuhan once said that "media is news," which means telecommunication influences us significantly by feeding us a variety of stories that affect almost everything in our lives, no matter what the news is really.
Let's think about some cases that have made the national headlines in recent years: we had an exciting afternoon watching the police chase the notorious criminal Lin Chun-sheng
No doubt, live news broadcasting brings us to the scene and quickly stimulates out interest. Perhaps older people still remember the fanaticism when the whole community watched the all-night-long live broadcast of Taiwan's junior baseball teams playing in the world championship in the 1960's.
People's emotions are usually inflamed so directly and so fast by live coverage that sometimes we are not watching TV anymore but rather worshipping a religious idol in a state of confused excitement. This kind of emotion is so easy to arose in a very short period of time. But then what?
The emotions set off by SNG broadcasts do not last long and do not go very deep either.
The examination of a tragedy induced by the media looks reasonable, but the factors behind them are rather emotional. The abuse of SNG by Taiwan TV stations is a reflection of our society's desire to pursue speed and convenience without thinking too much about either.
Behind the obvious entertainment value, the media does not have much concern for what it is providing. The managers of the mass media only care about increasing the entertainment value in order to make the audience "feel" the power of news.
However, to "feel" the news is not the same as understanding it.
Often we "feel" that a lot of news has happened, but we are not sure exactly what is going on or what will happen next.
The one-track mindset of the media, as shown by SNG broadcasts, conceal many important issues that people should know about.
For example, Taiwan is going to join the WTO, which will deal a serious blow to fragile traditional industries. However, television coverage of our progress toward this goal has focused predominately on high-tech industries; apparently there is little interest in the traditional industries that are actually more related to our daily lives. The flow of high-tech products is a worldwide trend. Nevertheless, when we are so busy chasing trends, a lack of self-examination in the Taiwan media, as well as in society as a whole, clearly shows a short-term logic.
Somebody asked the sociologist Jean Baudrillard once about what today's media is. He answered, "Today's media is a museum full of surprises." The word "museum" implies an institution that may occasionally surprise us, but for the most part is filled with cultural and background information on exhibits that we quickly forget. Moreover, sometimes we go to a museum just to be surprised or shocked; we don't really care about the true value of the exhibits themselves.
After turning off the TV -- after walking out of a museum that is full of surprises -- oddly enough, I felt lost and sad.
Chang Chih-wei is a graduate student in the department of sociology at Tunghai University.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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