As I ate dinner tonight, while staring at Sunday’s crossword puzzle wondering what a four-letter word meaning “polite interruption” could be, the news was on in the background. ABC’s Charlie Gibson was doing a short commercial, promoting his nightly news. As the commercial ended, Gibson said “What people care about most is: How does this affect ME?” He went on to say that the oh-so-smart ABC knows this and will deliver.
What? Did he really just say that? I stopped looking at the crossword puzzle. I’m not a dummy. I was a journalism major. I know the media is always trying to tap into people’s fears and emotions. But for some reason, the comment that people only care about themselves was so coarse and blatant, I cringed. And he wasn't even saying that this was a sad state of affairs. In fact, it was like he had discovered the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Ah ha! SELFISHNESS!
Perhaps I was offended because I had just heard that 150 people died in an Italian earthquake, that a St. Thomas freshman in St. Paul has been missing since yesterday. That a 16-year-old was raped by a third-level sex offender who was just released from jail a couple weeks ago. And all we care about is ourselves? Tomorrow, the news will tell you 1. if you live on a fault line and 2. If you do, how concerned you should be about an earthquake in your area. And then it will tell you what your freshman son or daughter should do to avoid being abducted. It will also provide a map of where all the sex offenders in your county live.
It will quickly turn away from the victims or the real news to focus on YOU, because that is, after all, what we want, right? I know our human tendency is to think only about ourselves, but I don’t believe that’s what we’re called to do. Maybe it's not easy or natural or even normal, but can we at least try?
I wonder what would happen if the news ended every single piece with information on how we could help, support, give back.
Charlie should try it.
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