Thank you for rejecting a shallow view of news. Please do not bury “in-depth human interest stories” in back pages or supplements. We are saturated with traditional front-page stories of mayhem and disaster. This has two dangerous results. First, we become inured to suffering, showing little interest in understanding or alleviating it. Second, we become hypersensitized to low-frequency dangers, leading to a mindset of intolerance against people who pose no real danger.
Front-page news must enable us to grasp the humanity of the news. When a cop is killed, the best news coverage informs us on vital questions such as: How did this wound those we trust to protect us? How can we understand that wound? How can we support decent men and women doing an increasingly dangerous job for an increasingly uncaring society?
As coverage of police-involved shootings increases, we need to understand more about the humanity of all parties involved. Where does the desire to relegate such stories to an obscure section come from? Do we only care about lurid articles? Are we too lazy to be educated by in-depth articles? Or would we rather not face the fact that news involves real people suffering real trauma? If we know, we might have to care and act.
Chaplain Julia C.S. Vernon, Grantsville