Granados Column: The optimism of violent news

What’s with the news? Murder, death and mayhem seems to rule the day at most major news outlets.

Let’s start with the stars.

Celebrity death has had the media in a tight-gripped bear hug for quite a few news cycles. Farrah Fawcett, Michael Jackson, Ted Kennedy and a few others have jumped to the top of national
conversation.

And this while there is a major debate over health care reform, two wars, huge economic problems. stimulus, bailouts and more.

OK. So they are famous; in many ways we felt as if we knew them and now they are gone. Fine.

But then there is murder.

I don’t need to tell anybody out there how prevalent murder is in the news pages. The weirder, the more attention it gets. You can practically hear the pundits and newscasters’ stomachs growling over the
news that Michael Jackson’s death has been ruled a homicide. That development raises one of the most famous celebrity deaths of recent memory to a whole new level.

Locally, while we do have many “good news” stories that we report on, we are not immune to the draw of murder reporting. Type in “murder” to Insidenova.com’s site-search feature and you get 825 hits.
Not that all those are referencing specific murders, but you get the picture: Murder is an often-used word on our site.

Checking out some recent articles posted on Insidenova.com, we find:

Suicide — “Police evacuate residents, man commits suicide” (Aug. 23).

Murder and Suicide — “Murder-suicide follows foreclosure” (Aug. 20).

Murder — “Police searching for ex-boyfriend in murder of woman’s husband” (Aug. 15).

Manslaughter — “Man gets 2 1/2 years for beating death” (Aug. 20).

And it’s not just killings that get media outlets riled up; it’s bad behavior of any sorts. Just look at coverage of health care reform nationally: The focus is less on the bill and more on the unruly crowds that
gather together at town hall meetings across the country. You could be forgiven for thinking that many in the national media care nothing for the issue and everything for the antics it inspires.

I list all of this as a primer for a question: Why does the news only seem to care about the bad?

That is one of the most common queries I have heard asked in reference to news media in general.

So yes . . . why?

I mean, there are plenty of people out there doing good, improving our world, building communities, succeeding, loving and caring.

Why don’t news outlets cover them as often or as prominently as the bad stuff?

I’ll give my answer in the form of a theory — I’m not sure if I read it somewhere, was told about it or made it up myself, but for the sake of this column we will call it “Alex’s Theory of the Status Quo.”

Simply put, this theory postulates that it is the job of the news media to cover deviations from the status quo.

We expect people not to kill other people. We expect people to not commit suicide. We expect people to behave themselves at public gatherings. We assume that people will do good, try to improve the
world, build communities, succeed, love and care.

That is the status quo, the baseline. It is so common that it blends in with the background and ceases to be interesting. But when someone behaves or acts otherwise, some in the media think people
should know.

Many people think of news as being pessimistic, but according to my theory, that isn’t true: News is actually optimistic.

Reporters and editors think that people should be acting right, so we focus on when they don’t. If the situation were reversed, the world would be a far scarier place where evil had become ordinary.

From this point of view, readers can actually be grateful each time they open a paper or switch on a television and hear about the latest atrocity or act of bad will. You are hearing about it because we are
surprised.

The tragedy would be if we weren’t.

Editorial Page Editor Alex Granados is afraid he will be the victim of violent crime because he reads the news too much. If you want to reassure him, send him an e-mail at agranadoster@gmail.com or
call him at 703-878-8069. If you are the would-be perpetrator, keep in mind that Alex speaks softly and carries a big stick.