Slashdot Mirror
Arthur C. Clarke Reports From Sri Lanka
Jeff Patterson writes "Sir Arthur C. Clarke has filed a damage report from his home in Sri Lanka on the Clarke Foundation page. He is fine, however 'among those affected are my staff based at our diving station in Hikkaduwa and holiday bungalow in Kahawa -- both beachfront properties located in areas worst hit. We still don't know the full extent of damage as both roads and phones have been damaged. Early reports indicate that we have lost most of our diving equipment and boats. Not all our staff members are accounted for -- yet.'"
if they stay, that's more people who need food, water and shelter. all of which are in short supply.
and more people to catch disease and use up scarce medical supplies.
rebuilding will take years. it is not feasible for them to stay.
if you really want to help then forget about token gestures designed to make you feel good about yourself and just give them your money (directly through appeals or indirectly via foreign aid).
No, it's not a foreign 9/11, it's WORSE. This tragedy, which cost thousands upon thousands more lives than 9/11, was not preventable.
Sure if warning systems were in placed it could have helped lower the death toll, but there is no way to prevent deaths altogether in this situation. At least 9/11 could have been prevented, but right now we have no way to stop earthquakes/tsunamis from happening.
But hey, we Americans don't care. Since only 8 Americans died (thus far) in the trajedy, the news isn't covering it the way you might think they would for a single event that has caused (so far) over 20,000 dead.
Why isn't primetime TV pre-empted for round the clock coverage of this? 8 Americans dead isn't enough to pre-empt programming.
It's events like this that can get one easily pissed off (yet again) over the bias in the American Media.
What's really sad is that the bias reflects most Americans: They don't care about it, since Americans weren't affected that much (except the 8 that died). Typical Americans, at most, only care enough to ask "Could this happen to us in America?"
Everytime I see FOX NEWS show little coverage of this trajedy and move on to the War in Iraq, I am reminded of the hilarious satire song from Team America: World Police:
"America...f*ck yeah!"
I think you missed the part where he said not all of his staff is accounted for. Or the part where he said he is contributing to the relief efforts. Instead, you picked out the most irrelevant part of what was said, and went with that. Good work.
It's events like this that can get one easily pissed off (yet again) over the bias in the American Media.
This isn't bias in American Media, this is bias in human brains. The further away something is from us personally, the less we care. It's not at all unique to the US.
I believe posters are recognized by their sig. So I made one.
Why isn't primetime TV pre-empted for round the clock coverage of this? 8 Americans dead isn't enough to pre-empt programming.
Because by and large:
1. It does not affect most Americans. That is not to say people do not care or are not interested; I have not yet found a person I've mentioned this to who hasn't already told me that they know about it. But the reality is, the number of Americans touched directly isn't high. This isn't media bias, it's audience. Saying the media is biased against this is like saying networks should pre-empt programming to talk about elections in other nations. In many ways that would even be MORE important to us locally than a tsunami that, while terrible, is done with. And that said,
2. It is pretty much done with. Yes, there is a TON of cleanup and humanitarian things going on, but how much is there to say about it? "The UN is helping." Okay, great. Do we need to break into programming or dedicate 24/7 coverage on CNN to say that? Do we need experts brought in to talk about what food is or something? Be reasonable. Things like 9/11 are covered in depth not only because of how directly and vastly it affects the average American, but because of how many questions remain unanswered. This was an earthquake, and a tsunami caused by it. It doesn't NEED vast coverage.
I disagree. Here in the UK there has been rather a lot of coverage. Most of the newspapers here have several pages worth of articles covering how bad things are, and how the humanitarian efforts are proceeding in the various affected countries. I'm not sure how many British people died in this tragedy, but I think it's got to be a dozen at most. So this tragedy is no 'closer' to us personally in the UK than it is in the US, but if the media coverage really is as bad in the US as grandparent poster seems to imply, then I think that really is a clear indication of the different attitudes taken by the media in our two countries.
Santa's suicide mission go!
Sorry to disagree with you, but worst hit would be the natives that will stay there to face all the conseqences of the disaster, people that have lost everything they had, people that have lost their loved ones.
Sorry, but I got really pissed today watching the news and seeing a tourist comming back from Phuket complaining that they (he and his wife) lost everything they took on their holidays. What have you lost, little men? Two suitcases of clothes and a digital camera??? Look around you, little men, and see all those people that had little and now have nothing, look at the corpses floating and mothers mourning for their children. Then go on complaining about your digital camera little men. I won't cry for you.
I find that statement a little left of center. The worst hit will be the tourists? Hell no. The worst hit will be the hundreds of thousands of poor people whose livelihoods have been destroyed/changed forever. Not mention the fact that 1/3 of the dead are children.
Yes many tourists have lost their lives, but many of those who have not will be able to get back on the plane and go home to their easy lives back in suburbia. The citizens in the likes of Sri Lanka, Thailand etc have no way of escaping this nightmare.
*shrug* Maybe Im just being overly sensitive.
Medraut
So this tragedy is no 'closer' to us personally in the UK than it is in the US...
Many of the countries hit by this earthquake/tsunami are former British colonies (India, Sri Lanka/Ceylon, Malaysia, Maldives, Myanmar/Burma) and others were formerly under the colonial power of European nations (Indonesia was once Dutch ruled, Madagascar was French ruled, etc).
It seems that the UK (and Europe) has much closer personal ties to these countries than the US, so that could explain the increased coverage in the UK.
I agree though, the short attention span of American media definitely has something to do with it. It's interesting that some people are saying "that could never happen to the US, so that's why people don't care."
There's a volcano on the Canary Islands that could erupt and trigger a tsunami that would deluge the Eastern coast of the United States. The west coast of the US is vulnerable to tsunamis created by the "Ring of Fire". Maybe this disaster will not only get counties around the Indian Ocean to take tsunamis more seriously, but also people on the coasts of the US as well.
----- rL
you fail to concede that responsibility and accountability is not the sole province of the usa, and that if something happens in the indian ocean, the usa should help, and it is helping...
but the failure to act in a timely manner and not having a system in place to save lives is something the governments local to the indian ocean have proved shameful about, not the usa
because your pov seems to demand of the usa to respect other people (warn them appropriately to save lives)... by disrespecting other people (set up a system that disregards their own abilities to take care of themselves)
the usa is a member of the global community, not an owner of the global community
you cannot condemn the usa for not doing something that your own pov insists they cannot do
follow the logic of your position to its conclusion, and you will see the logical inconsistencies in what you are saying
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
All the recriminations now begin, even before the bodies are buried (or even counted). Bottom Line: This is an unprecedented natural disaster, and the same warning/response systems that existed in the pacific didn't really exist in that area of the world.
This is something so far out of the realm of most peoples experience, that it's quite natural to assume some incredulity on their part. Do you pay attention to the wide-eyed guy on the street corner with the sign that says "The end is near?" I thought not... most people ignore him, just as you probably do.
Just to add to the political fray, some reports have UN officials already complaining that the US and other western nations are being "stingy" with their aid packages... and even suggesting that those countries raise taxes on their citizens to pay for more aid (if you believe the Wash. Times).
Maybe some of these folks should focus more on helping, rather than wasting their breath trying to find a scapegoat.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
What makes you think they didn't try? Even if GWB got on the phone and called the heads of government of all the countries likely to be affected, without an emergency response system, by the time the news filtered down to the people who could do something about it, it would have been too late.
Anyone who blames the US for this is simply looking for excuses to blame the US for everything.
Hehe - I'm a spaniard living in America and I too was in Madrid over the weekend (still am, actually). I agree with you that Europe is covering this quite a bit, but not outside the normal shows. TV is still going on, regular shows are being programmed. During the news this gets absolutely top billing and the same footage is repeated over and over again. Still, it's nowhere near 9/11 news reporting. During that tragedy EVERY SHOW on EVERY CHANNEL was preempted, in many cases there wasn't even any advertising. Channels that had no good news reporting simply switched over to the CNN feed.
Nonetheless, I have to point out a flaw in your reasoning and the grandparent post's - the reason this is different than 9/11 is not because of the distance, or evil americans not caring about foreign citizens. That influences only how much time you spend on the specific story in the news shows.
The difference is, 9/11 was a man-made disaster. Back in 2001, someone decided to take down those two towers, and do it in a particularly gruesome way that set back american civil liberties pretty seriously. Some asshole in a hat figured that he didn't like us for a some reasons that I'm sure feel perfectly logical to him and attacked us. Had it been a nation doing the attacking and not a group of terrorists hiding all over the world they would have gotten nuked off the surface of the earth.
This disaster however was natural. The mole people didn't get up last week and figure out they had to kill Arthur C. Clarke before his satellites discover the extent of their underground lair - no, it simply happened. It is tragic, it is terrible, but Mother Nature did not declare war on the Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India - it was just a very unfortunate event. One that could have been ameliorated with the proper warning systems, but that's besides the point now - hopefully they'll be better prepared for the next one.
-Jack Ash
It's called the proper chain of command. If there's no contact point for this kind of information, then there's no quick way to get people to realize the severity. CNN probably saw it on the AP wire and said *yawn
8,"Another earthquake. Jim see if you can run down a 20 second bit for the 10 o'clock news."
Three hours isn't long enough for a warning when there's no efficient mechanism in place for dealing with the event in rapid fashion. Hell, it takes an hour here in my corner of the US for the local TV/radio stations to get school delays/closings up and running when we have an unexpected snow. If Sri Lanka monitored an earthquake off the Atlantic coast of the US, and suspected a possible tidal wave headed for a group of barrier islands in the mid atlantic region, which TV or radio station would you call? I live 400 miles away, and I have no idea. If you did call, and spoke with a heavy accent (you do know all the languages in the world, right?), do you think they'd believe you and put it on the nes immediately? Of course not, they'd try to verify it before they broadcast such a warning. For an area with so few tidal waves, this sounds like a prank call to me.
Unfortunately, it takes a tragedy before those with the means decide it is worth their while to prepare for such disasters. I'm sure that this will spur more countries to create the pathways of communication necessary to mitigate damage in the future.
This is a tragedy, and a terrible one. I agree that it is worse than the 9/11/01 attack - far worse in human loss.
[aside] I believe it is less shocking because natural disasters occur on a fairly regular basis, whereas terrorists flying passenger jets into buildings is crazy. More improtantly, the cameras were rolling when the real tragedy occured - the buildings collaped on/with many occupants. Drama, horror, immediacy. [/aside]
My thoughts and prayers go out to all who have lost loved ones, and I hope that the country can pull together and get the physical damage repaired as soon as possible.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Wow... fuck you people. We're talking 50,000+ dead and all you can think about is your wallet?! They're now facing an epidemic of disease from all the rotting human and animal corpses. They need money for tarps and drinkable water. There is _no_ comparison with september 11th. These people need help, people like you make me ashamed to be American.