[Archived] Spare a thought.....

[dave birch]

for Ryan Nelsen as Christchurch NZ gets devastated by another earthquake.

He will be affected by this and totally frustrated at not being able to be there to help.

I trust that any Rovers supporters there (I know of a couple) are safe and well.

As I write, there are 65 people dead.

A shame, Christchurch is such a beautiful city.

There is talk of boulders the size of houses crashing down the hillside at Lyttleton and of one of the glaciers, in the mountains to the west, shedding massive amounts of ice.

[broadsword]

I'd be sparing a thought for the 65 people dead, Dave.

[dave birch]

Indeed, Bryan.

That news came through as I was typing.

[Iceman]

that is terrible news, condolences to all those who have lost a family member or friend.

[roversmum]

Very worrying, and frightening for the poor folk involved.

Thoughts and prayers for all.

[RovertheHill]

Thankfully our friends who live there are okay but they said it was far more scary than the one last year. My thoughts are with them all

[colin]

I've got a friend living in Christchurch with her family.

Their house was saved from the September earthquake because it's made out of wood. (It's not a shack, it's a lovely house)So it was fairly flexible.

Her husband is currently working for the UN in Sudan.

I'm currently very scared that she & her family are going to be OK.

[dave birch]

I post this as I regard much of the media as nothing better than dregs.

The first bit is about "the media" catching a moment in time.

It's taken from an ABC (Australia) website, where, obviously, the reporter has some values.

"All three are caught by the camera in a frozen spasm of grief. It is torture to see. It is an extraordinary intrusion ... a stolen moment of agony that has nothing to do with any of us. The news agencies that flog the image have nothing to offer these people in return. No empathy, no support, merely a momentary exploitation of sorrow in the hope the image might arrest the passing internet eye and draw traffic. Grotesque.

In these situations the media trade on the rather generous assumption on our part that they must be there because they care, that in being there they bring the tragedy home to all of us and therefore, somehow, make a difference. We ought to challenge that. Or at least question it.

Here's another case in point. This morning Fairfax papers published bold paper-wide images of a man pulled from the Christchurch wreckage. Dirt smeared. Bloodied. But alive. The paper does not come to these things through some disengaged, mechanical process. People are involved: shooting the image, moving on.

The picture was of one Shane Tomlin. His image raced round the world ... a sudden visual shorthand for disaster, tragedy and loss.

And then he vanished. His family -- as of this afternoon -- can find neither hide nor hair of him.

Used, you might say, and forgotten. Because that's the sad truth in these things: that the media does not empathise. The media is not there to help. The media does not feel your pain."

Thank goodness for publicly funded Radio/TV/Internet.

[philipl]

I was online with a guy at the Uni in Christchurch when the earthquake struck. It was an unnerving experience to be at the other end as someone was experiencing it but nothing compared with what the people of Christchurch experienced. He, his friends and family are all OK and not suffered anything worse than broken glass and crockery.

The photographs are shocking and show that even with the most rigorous of building regulations, modern buildings still fail.

[jim mk2]

It's extraordinary that someone should use a national tragedy in which at least 75 people have died and 300 are still unaccounted for to continue their irrational dislike of the "media", show their ignorance again of how it works and criticise journalists and photographers for doing their jobs. The "media" exists to report and comment on the news, often in extremely difficult and distressing circumstances such as the earthquake in New Zealand. This will sometimes involve photographs of people in distress or dying which some might find upsetting but convey the human suffering of a tragedy on the scale of the disaster in Christchurch. Journalists have to be emotionally detached sometimes because they are professionals and it is their work but from the junior reporter on the local newspaper reporting on a serious road traffic accident, to the war reporter in the frontline in Iraq and Afghanistan to the journalists working alongside the police and rescue services in Christchurch I doubt if any have not been affected at times by the horrific scenes confronting them. For that reason they deserve sympathy as well admiration for a job well done.

Sympathy to all with connections in New Zealand and Christchurch in particular, a small oasis of English heaven in the southern hemisphere.

[Billy Castell]

My Wellington based cousin is donating 100% of her business profits to the relief effort.

[Foxxx]

Ryan Nelsen's sister shaken into early labour

[Kiwiwannabe]

Nelsen is in Christchurch and doing what he can to help: Nelsen sees that Christchurch kids are alright

He would have had a tough night though as Christchurch suffered 7 aftershocks, all centered close to the city.

[joey_big_nose]

What has happened in NZ and now Japan is a tragedy and my thoughts go out to all those affected. It is a real worry and I hope all the missing are found and those injured recover.

It's extraordinary that someone should use a national tragedy in which at least 75 people have died and 300 are still unaccounted for to continue their irrational dislike of the "media", show their ignorance again of how it works and criticise journalists and photographers for doing their jobs. The "media" exists to report and comment on the news, often in extremely difficult and distressing circumstances such as the earthquake in New Zealand. This will sometimes involve photographs of people in distress or dying which some might find upsetting but convey the human suffering of a tragedy on the scale of the disaster in Christchurch. Journalists have to be emotionally detached sometimes because they are professionals and it is their work but from the junior reporter on the local newspaper reporting on a serious road traffic accident, to the war reporter in the frontline in Iraq and Afghanistan to the journalists working alongside the police and rescue services in Christchurch I doubt if any have not been affected at times by the horrific scenes confronting them. For that reason they deserve sympathy as well admiration for a job well done.

Sympathy to all with connections in New Zealand and Christchurch in particular, a small oasis of English heaven in the southern hemisphere.

Depends on how the media handle it. If it is done sensitively that's great but all too often tragedy is sensationalised and exploited to sell papers. Part of that is the public's fault for buying it up but the tabloid media particularly stokes the flames for its own profit which is shameful. I have massive respect for what journalists do but they have a responsibility to balance and care.

Editors need to take the lead because they commission, buy and shape the content. This is the same as politicians requirement to handle their jobs effectively and fairly, and banker's requirements to conduct their business ethically.

The problem is that media deserves heavy criticism all too often but as the media is the only principle organ to air criticism this is often totally overlooked. Theoretically one media outlet should criticise another and some do (eg. Private Eye) but mostly the major organs shy away from critiquing one another to try and keep things neat and cosy and avoid tit for tat combat. Plus different outlets often share the same owners.

The hope is that the internet can be used by public to vent anger at insensitive and imbalanced reporting and analysis as has happened in the past, but I would like to see more of it. In my eyes the majority of private media in the UK is in a much poorer state than the institutions they are supposed to report on, with little to check and balance their excesses.

Reporting paints a picture that the UK is leaping from crisis to turmoil to yet another crisis. The critique of the issues is usually valid, but the exaggeration and highly emotive nature of the reporting has lead debate in this country to a position of despair which is not borne out by the fact of the quality of life that surrounds us. People are switching off from an interest in politics, economics etc as it is seen as an 'impossible and corrupt' system which it plainly isn't.

The damage to the quality of debate by tabloid reporting and editorial standards has been massive and is on-going. And as it is ethically and democratically impossible for the law of the land to regulate the press stringently, we are dependent on the standards of the people who operate within the press. And these are all too often found wanting.