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I Just Have to Believe: Media Edition

Yesterday Flight MH 17 was shot down over Ukraine. I am saddened and heart sick that this is the level the world needs to go to in order to gain some fleeting feeling of control. I have, am and will continue to pray for those who died and are affected by this tragic event.

But what makes me concerned is that from the moment that word hit "the wire" that there was a plane crash, the media was "breaking into" programs to broadcast images and tweets from Twitter about what may or may not have happened. It's not that I'm worried about the news bulletin that the crash happened. I'm most concerned that before any one knew what had happened speculation was being flung around as news. I'm concerned that we had to spend hours looking at the broadcast of black smoke. Folks died, people are mourning - how is this honoring those lives? How is this responsible reporting?

A popular response to these concerns is "well turn off the TV." Guess what, I did. I went and visited with folks who are homebound and in nursing homes. I made a difference and explained medications to folks (I am a CMA so I'm not overstepping bounds). I sat with a person who's dementia had them reliving their own tragic things. While I did turn off the TV and radio and did something to make a positive presence in the world, so many people didn't. While society may not need to watch hours of Judge Judy and Springer, was there not something else that we could be broadcasting?

I just have to believe that if the media offered up different portrayals of life happening, we might look at things differently. What if we broadcasted hours of volunteers working in a community garden, sharing their time with others and also talked with them about their stories and what brought them to this place and time? What if we broadcast the 2 hours of Spoons I played last night and the conversations we had that included, favorite hymns, what is baptism and confirmation, favorite Bible stories and a lot of general randomness? Maybe we'd be different or not. I think that would honor those who died in such a tragic way.

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