Opinion Body blows
The foam wasnt artificial snow or washing powder Nirma or any other detergent. Observed carefully,it looked horrifyingly like an inert child.
The foam wasnt artificial snow or washing powder Nirma or any other detergent. Observed carefully,it looked horrifyingly like an inert child. The remains of the dead after the Mangalore Air India Express crash had a surreal quality. So when you watched a survivor,lying on a hospital bed with white (medicated) cream on his face,for a split second he resembled a man who had just had a shave. He had: a close shave with death.
A few days earlier,TV news had caught on camera the fatally injured Gorkha leader,Madan Tamang on a Darjeeling street. The blood covered his face like a shroud,his features were disheveled like crumpled paper and his body was held up by an act of memory or by the strength of the man who desperately tried to hold on to the life of him for all he was worth. The camera shots of his mortally injured body were circled,highlighted and repeatedly telecast just in case you missed the action.
On May 17,we saw bodies strewn on the roadside like discarded garments after a bus had been blown up by Maoists in Dantewada. The camera lingered on some,before settling on the burnt out skeletal remains of the vehicle. The image that lingers is of the clothes. There was a bizarre urge to reach out,pick them up,fold and put them neatly away. Eerie.
Television has been witness to several violent incidents in recent weeks and we have not been spared the trauma. There seems to be a desire to show us how brutal the deaths were,how tragic the incidents. There seems to be no desire to hide the worst,to be sensitive to the feelings of those who lost family and friends,or to remember that such visuals leave an indelible imprint on the mind. Can still remember the haunting images of Phoolan Devi and Veerappan after they were killed and the TV camera closed in on their lifeless faces. Its as if news TV wants to confront us with the bloodiest images it can capture,to show us just how bad it can get.
There has been an unwritten protocol that TV news should avoid wallowing in violence. Such footage is injurious to children and not much better for adults. The depiction of violence has been accused of encouraging copycat crimes,violence in the young and numbing them to the pain of injury and possible death,while glorifying and providing unnecessary free publicity to the perpetrators of violent acts. They say it might increase the idea of retribution (the bodies of dead civilians and police at Dantewada could only increase public outrage against the Maoists). None of this has been proved but we may believe the evidence of our own eyes: you instinctively blink,shut them and turn away.
The print media carries photographs that are equally gruesome. But it is one thing to glance at a photo,it is another to be confronted by it all day. Why does TV news feel the need to telecast such images 24×7? Theyve even dispensed with the somewhat sanctimonious warnings about the disturbing nature of the visuals. Most of us dont want to watch the footage so could channels stop showing it?
If the air crash deserved full day coverage,the prime ministers press conference certainly did not. Everyone agreed he said nothing that made the headlines and yet,he was headline news all of Monday perhaps because the press conference was over before noon and provided channels with all the news they needed for the day. They spent it trying to read meaning between the lines where none existed.They picked what they considered to be the PMs juiciest answers amongst his rather dry comments and offered them to a panel of commentators (mostly print journalists) for knife and fork dissection and may the unkindest cut of all win.
shailaja.bajpai@expressindia.com
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