headlines

Alright, one quick complaint. I get the purpose/necessity/ease of headlines. However, one has to wonder, who are the people sitting behind the screens who write them? For example, in today’s news was a tragic accident where a man ran over his wife and and son at a campsite. The two headlines regarding the story on CNN were “SUV runs over wife, son camping in tent” and “Dad runs over campers.” Both of these headlines are erroneous in their own ways. Headline number one evokes a vision of a big SUV running over his own wife and child, smaller versions of himself. The second makes it seem like a man just randomly forged through the wilderness and hit some people enjoying a vacation. Both headlines end up being complete and utter misrepresentations of the story, for it was no simple camping trip in the first place. The man is an Iraq veteran, a husband and a father of two, and they are homeless. Upon leaving the military seven months ago, the man had been unable to find a job. He and his family had been living at the campsite for over a week and were planning to reside there for the rest of the summer. Is there not something strangely familiar about veterans returning from duty only to find themselves on the streets without work nor homes? I’m horrified. Just for what it’s worth, the woman’s injuries were minor and the story reported that the son, though hospitalized was in stable condition as of now. 

I wonder if people who write and report on the news become impervious to the sadness that surround them, almost completely unable to feel anything by the ends of their careers. I feel like I would.

So sad.