Monday, July 14, 2008

In response to the headline in the NYTimes today: "9 Americans Die in Afghan Attack: The attack was the worst against Americans in Afghanistan in three years and illustrated the growing threat of Taliban militants and their associates"...

Why do articles always position an event in the most negative of terms? It's always "the attack was the worst in ___ months, years, days, seconds" etc. It puts the reader always thinking in a negative trajectory, and anticipating more negative events. This very same event may have been described in a different context built around different stats: "the attack left 9 dead, the lowest death toll in an Afghan attack in ____ months"...It seems that whatever time frame will make it the "worst" or have the most dramatic, dysphoric effect, that is the one that will be used strategically in the article. Or if it had said "it was the worst attack of the week" yet a graph accompanied it showing that yes, it was in fact the worst of the week, but that this week saw a 60% decrease in militant activity, that would mean a decreasing- not increasing- threat of Taliban militants, here, too, the prose of storied statistics mislead.

It seems that whatever conclusion a story "needs" (i.e. to qualify as newsworthy and dramatic) you can find statistics and "evidence" to support that prefabricated conclusion.

No comments: