Take a walk in my shoes pal
Posted in Faith and God, Ramble on on February 2nd, 2008 by FKG
As a kid I once asked what the definition of news was, not that I didn’t already know what it meant. To me it was war and terror, poverty and death, politicians and criminals, yuppies and puppies.
Maybe what I really wanted to know, like so many other people my age, was why news was called “news” and why it wasn’t called “olds” instead. If news was going to be defined as recent events or developments that have already happened then olds would be a more appropriate word, or so I thought. I found I was too naive and I was probably a hundred years too young to understand the concept. Eventually someone came up with a definition slash reason that I was finally happy with. I was told that news was the “new information” about the recent events or developments not the recent events or developments itself which were in the past like I had stated, and would be called history instead. The reason why it’s news was because people back in the old days were too lazy to say “new information” so they used an aussie concept, they shortened it down and hence called it “news”. I thought to myself, now that I’ve got my head around this I’m probably not a hundred years too young to understand the concept after all.
My next query was why people were facinated by these so called new information or news? I too as I grew a little older was drawn to it. After all what’s so good about war and terror, poverty and death, politicians and criminals, yuppies and puppies?
Well maybe there is something to be said about that last one, after all puppies are cute. Except when they chase after you when you’re trying to get away from them, at first you make a brisk walk, but then you have to make a run for it, only to find that the little terrors are keeping up with you. That’s why I feel sorry for postmen terrorised by guard dogs and small children who have never encountered a dog before.
I regard news as gloomy subjects, except when they’re happy ones such as puppies as previously mentioned. One theory is that there is a masochistic aspect to our soul in each and everyone of us. We like to hear gloom and doom, and let’s face it, if news was pizza hut, the only pizza flavour that would get delivered to us is, you guessed it, gloom and doom. News in papers, news on the internet and especially news on televisions are mostly filled with criminals, drugged up celebrities, dying people from third world countries and death in war. The song Horror movie by the legendary classic rock band the Skyhooks is as relevant today as it was during the seventies, when the horrors of war was first aired on television, bringing it right into people’s family living rooms. That’s why the only thing that I’d recommend watching on the news that doesn’t involve a conflict is the weather, at least the sheilas doing the weather are easy on the eyes.
Fortunately I don’t subscribe to this everyone is a masochist school of thought. My theory is, that while none of us like to hear or see all the wrongs in the world, we want to experience it. Not because we like and enjoy it, but because we empathize and want to steel ourselves. Steel ourselves for the worse, we want to know what other unfortunates feel just in case one day we are put in the same situations. News is like someone (maybe God) tapping you on the shoulder and saying “take a walk in my shoes pal and tell your story walking.”
Then again I could be wrong about the whole news thing. Being a hundred years too young to understand could be true after all.
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