Suspense surrounding the fate of kidnapped journalist Danny Pearl ended last week when the U.S. State Department received a video of the reporter?s brutal murder, ending any last hopes he might still be alive. The tragic death of the Wall Street Journal reporter, who disappeared from a Karachi restaurant Jan. 23, appropriately made front pages all across the country.
However, Pearl’s sensational kidnapping has also spawned lots of less-than-responsible reporting.
Even the smallest twists and turns in Pearl’s excrutiatingly drawn-out month-long saga automatically made headlines, regardless of their level of newsworthiness.
We’ve all read about how the kidnappers claimed Pearl was affiliated with the CIA or Mossad. Countless stories gave us the exacting details of the kidnappers’ demands: in exchange for his release’ Pearl?s captors insisted on, among other things, $2 million and better treatment of Guantanamo Bay detainees.
By this point, it really wouldn’t be much of an exaggeration to say you’d have to have been living in a cave to not know about Pearl and his disastrous plight. After all, even the minute developments in the Pearl case have been examined, re-examined and then re-examined again by every American news outlet. The media just couldn’t get enough of Danny Pearl.
And the media frenzy probably won’t slow down. Last Thursday may have brought an end to speculation about Pearl’s fate, but the media will most likely continue to give us saturation-level coverage of the story, albeit with a somewhat different focus. Prime suspect Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, who was arrested Feb. 12 in Pakistan and appeared in court just last week, promises to take over as the key player in the unfolding drama.
The massive amount of attention the media is giving the Pearl tragedy makes one wonder how much of the flurry is based solely on the case’s newsworthiness and how much is based on the fact that all the key players happen to be journalists themselves.
Much of the hoopla surrounding Pearl’s case is directly attributable to the media’s close proximity to the case (remember, Pearl himself wasn’t the only journalist involved; various other media organizations served as the kidnappers? primary means of contacting the U.S. government).
Like the string of anthrax attacks targeting prominent members of the media industry, the Pearl case hits a little bit too close to home. That the news industry has a vested interest in the story is obvious in most of the coverage it has received thus far.
Pearl’s story is almost guaranteed a front-page spot in most papers, regardless of whether or not a major development occurred, while numerous editorials paint him as a untouchable saint.
I’m not trying to say Pearl’s tragic death wasn’t newsworthy; his unfortunate saga should have ? and would have ? made headlines regardless of his profession.
However, just because media found the Pearl kidnapping to be extremely poignant doesn’t mean the rest of the country necessarily shared their endless fascination. The media industry should have been more critical in deciding how to cover the Pearl kidnapping and should have made a greater attempt to separate its own vested interests with the concerns and interests of the rest of the country.
The news media is supposed to report what happens in as unbiased a manner as possible. While complete objectivity is, of course, impossible, news media seem to have gone a little bit overboard this time. Relishing their own 15 minutes of fame, media seemed to forget they exist primarily to report, not to be reported on.
Kristin Wieben ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in political science and French.
