Alas, Headlines May Not Be True

Okay, so this article has the headline, "Dogs kill man at actor Ving Rhames' LA home." Now, I am sure Reuters did due diligence so we can trust the headline of the story; oh wait, this a media outlet? Forget it. And of course, I am correct. See, in this article, headlined "Police: Rhames' Dogs May Not Have Caused Death," the police take front stage, rather than the media in giving the facts.

Now, of course the first article quotes a cop, but compare the two headlines and you decide which one better conveys that words of the officer to readers. Here is the quote, taken straight from the first article.

"It appeared that the person suffered a number of injuries as a result of the dog mauling," Sgt. Lee Sands said. "There were numerous dog bites all over his body, but the exact cause of death is pending the coroner's ruling."

Hmm...interesting. So what is the real story? Both articles point out that dogs can turn on owners, but did that happen here? Alas, for the media, the past is gone, never to be repeated or remembered, unless it points out subjects in a bad way of course. Neither article mentioned an animal attack from a few years back, one the media had a field day with until one of the people involved got a chance to comment.

A few years ago, Sigfried and Roy were doing a show and one of them (yeah, I can't tell them apart and it isn't important which one) was caught in the mouth by one of their famous tigers. Now, immediately there were calls to kill the beast (ahh, Disney humor) and stories were run about cruelty to animals (eh, and shooting the cat would be humane right?). That is until the other guy got up and explained how tigers operate. See, when a tiger is in danger, it grabs its cubs in the mouth and drags them to safety. The tiger thought it was in danger and grabbed the performer to get him to safety.

Could this be the same situation? I don't know. But remember, the police don't have a clue yet, but that doesn't stop the media reports. So why do we allow the media the right to free speech to spread lies? As I believe the Supreme Court decided, it was because without the knowledge that they wouldn't be punished for lies, the media might actually have to be competent enough to wait on stories, thereby depriving the public of news. (I guess to the Court, lies parading as news is better than silence, just like foreign law is good to use when the Constitution doesn't authorize some governmental power. Give me a little more media accuracy and I can handle the occasional silence rather than be forced to suffer corrections buried in newspapers on page 14 and the correction link never quite making it online where the article itself was.)

Well, I hope you learned something from this. Unlike the nutjobs who use the "don't judge a book by its cover" to force people to accept serial killers and child rapists, I will use it the phrase to caution against ever trusting the media. Or to quote Ronald Reagan, "Trust but verify." True of the media as of the Soviet Union, both of whom thought propaganda didn't exist (it was truth, see?).