Joel Achenbach of the Washington Post writes on the Achenblog Should Cho Have the Last Word?, and in the post he points out that NBC's decision to air video from the VT killer has received considerable criticism: "We're seeing some very strong opinions this morning, mostly negative, about the decision by NBC to air excerpts of the Cho video and to publish Cho's photos. The rest of the mainstream media are taking a hit, too, for alleged sensationalism." A psychiatrist interviewed by ABC even called it a "social catastrophe" and suggested that parents should cut the images out of newspapers so their children don't see them.
I think that last suggestion is going too far, but I do think the some of the mainstream media has, as usual, sensationalized this story. I used washingtonpost.com the most on Monday to keep up with events, but I also looked at a few other sites including MSNBC and CNN, and I was just plain disgusted to see CNN use giant headlines like "Bloodbath" when washingtonpost.com used much more informational headlines that didn't include such sensational words. We all know and probably don't want to imagine how horrific the scene was, much less be told in movie poster headlines by a "news" site. I was also pretty shocked yesterday when I visited MSNBC.com and was greeted with a giant photo of a gun pointing right at me!
So, I'm curious what you think? I certainly don't think any information should be withheld, but I wonder if it's really necessary to go to the other extreme in how it's presented...
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