patrick.net

anonymous says

Ratings and Revenue.

I agree with most of your comment but I wonder, why wouldn't the ratings be higher for a story of a local person who died needlessly from a disease that should have been curable by now and that might strike the viewers' families at any moment?

People dying every day of natural causes is not news. Folks who have been kidnapped and beheaded is news. I suppose if millions of folks were kidnapped and beheaded daily since the beginning of time, it would no longer be news.

curious2 says

So, my question is about proportionality. How is it that the tragic story of two journalists drowns out the stories of millions of other people? Is it because the military industrial complex controls the media and wants more war against ISIL, so it can sell more munitions? Is it because media organizations tend to report about other media organizations, and journalists tend to report about other journalists? Or is it because people want distraction from their own mortality and its most likely causes, i.e. heart disease and cancer? A media adage says, "If it bleeds, it leads." But, of all the stories that bleed, why these?

curious2 says

anonymous says

Ratings and Revenue.

I agree with most of your comment but I wonder, why wouldn't the ratings be higher for a story of a local person who died needlessly from a disease that should have been curable by now and that might strike the viewers' families at any moment?

Interesting set of questions. My answer....We are desensitized by the thousands of murders and needless deaths. Tens of thousands die in road accidents, but they are not really news, and never were. The barbaric and cruel beheadings is something we are not used to. It shocks and horrifies us, as it is something out of the medieval ages where cruelty, brutality and genocide were common place.
If you were to go back in time to the Medieval ages, you will notice people being desensitized to this kind of brutality. If you showed them a video of a high speed car accident, they would shocked and fascinated at a car crashing into a tree and killing 5 passengers in an instant. To them it would be headline news.

as of 2010, the rate is 6891 per day, 2,515,458 per year.

curious2 says

The reports were also the lead story in America, where around 100,000 people die every day, including many intentional homicides.

SoftShell says

as of 2010, the rate is 6891 per day, 2,515,458 per year.

curious2 says

The reports were also the lead story in America, where around [updated: 10,000] people die every day, including many intentional homicides.

Thanks SoftShell for catching that - I had typed an extra zero, and have now corrected it. Sorry for the error.

Reading further, I see that your numbers match the the current official CDC report, which is based on data from 2010.

Strategist's answer covers this quite well. Japanese people are particularly affected by how their media presents things even compared to people from other countries.

Shinzo Abe has run Japanese economy into the ground via borrowing/printing-and-spending. Abenomics (the same set of Keynesian policies practiced by FDR and Hitler in the mid-1930's, Japanese and Italians in the late 1920's, and Soviets in the early 1920's) has reached a stage where the population face eminent mass inflation and bad debts will have to have their attention diverted by war. Hitler, Tojo and Mussolini all found wars of conquest as excuses for running up more government debt and asking the public sacrifice more in giving up their credit claims (the worth of their money and their savings), as did FDR in the name of war preparation. What we are seeing in Japan is just a bunch of politicians trying to crank up the war machine in a post-WWII pacifist country under special constitutional constraint against waging wars beyond their borders.

A few decades from now, history may well conclude that the purpose of "Abenomics" is to deteriorate the Japanese economy to such a degree that the population would give in to war cries.

Call it Crazy says

Who would you put your money on?

Emphasis on money:

Reality says

What we are seeing in Japan is just a bunch of politicians trying to crank up the war machine in a post-WWII pacifist country under special constitutional constraint against waging wars beyond their borders.

Yes, the Japanese government has been borrowing and spending hugely on all sorts of things except munitions, and the military industrial complex wants a bigger cut (in every sense of that word) of the action. That seems the most plausible explanation: follow the money, and ask cui bono.

Reality says

deteriorate the Japanese economy to such a degree that the population would give in to war cries.

That resembles George Orwell's analysis of war in 1984: the purpose is to destroy surplus production in a way that the population will find psychologically acceptable, in order to maintain scarcity and preserve the privileged position of the few at the apex of the pyramid scheme. In my opinion, Obamneycare serves much the same purpose, as the US continues to spend more than any other country in the history of the world, mostly on products and "services" that confer little or no benefit. To borrow an idea from Empire of Debt, all empires rise and fall, and so while ascendant they must seek out the cause of their eventual fall, until as a matter of historical inevitability they find it.

curious2 says

So, my question is about proportionality. How is it that the tragic story of two journalists drowns out the stories of millions of other people?

This Japanese story is just part of the larger story about ISIS. I don't think you can compare natural, accidental and criminal death to the Islamist Klingons who are literally crucifying, beheading, sexually enslaving thousands of people, and ethnically cleansing a million more.

Ancient religious communities have been completely wiped out by the Islamists in the last 2 years. These communities that managed to survive thousands of years of torment including the Roman Empire, Plague, Crusades, fall of Ottoman Empire. But they couldn't survive 21st century Islam. I think that is kind of a big deal IMO.

With the exception of Ukraine, what else is going on in the world that is more profound in terms of number of victims, strategic location (oil) and bat-shit crazy ideology and aspirations of the combatants than what is going on in the middle east right now?

I don't get this. ISIS has been doing much worse stuff to everyone around the globe. And this one incident is going to make a difference?

socal2 says

Ancient religious communities have been completely wiped out by the Islamists in the last 2 years. These communities that managed to survive thousands of years of torment including the Roman Empire, Plague, Crusades, fall of Ottoman Empire. But they couldn't survive 21st century Islam. I think that is kind of a big deal IMO.

No one can survive the cruel brutality of these barbarians. Islam is clearly the most effective killing machine ever devised by mankind.

socal2 says

With the exception of Ukraine, what else is going on in the world that is more profound in terms of number of victims, strategic location (oil) and bat-shit crazy ideology and aspirations of the combatants than what is going on in the middle east right now?

Nothing.....nothing at all.
My genuine fear is these barbarians getting hold go nukes.

Nobody says

I don't get this. ISIS has been doing much worse stuff to everyone around the globe. And this one incident is going to make a difference?

It makes a lot of difference to the Japanese who have largely been left untouched by Islam's tentacles. There is hardly a country that has not felt the brutality of these barbarians. What we need is a united world that aggressively pursues terrorists wherever they may be, and severely punishes countries that harbor them, like Pakistan.