Hurricane Dennis vs. London Bombing

Sitting here in Guyana with the television turned on, the bombing in London seems to be the center of the traditional media - CNN is the main service that I can view on cable television, and like the September 11th attacks, it's getting lots of air time. But I live in another world. I live in a world where Hurricane Dennis has killed 4 people from Haiti - the Caribbean region, where not much is even to be read from ICT mailing lists from Latin America.

162 technorati listed posts mention London Explosion. 1,015 technorati posts mention London bombing. 626 technorati posts mention London bomb.

1,164 technorati entries mention Hurricane Dennis.

162 technorati posts mention Hurricane Dennis and Haiti.

In an office earlier today, someone asked me what I thought of the bombings in London. I said, of course, that it was a horrible thing, but that it was political and I have no control over what people decide to do to each other. I could stand on a soapbox and talk about how horrible the bombing was. It was horrible. The fact that such attacks is horrible, and no less so than the ability of a country to unilaterally invade another country on false pretenses. The whole thing is a nasty loop, and I can find no reason to defend either side who willingly creates casualties from innocent bystanders. Perhaps it's easier to say that nobody is innocent, and continue killing each other. I do not understand why it continues, I cannot control that it continues, but I am certain that if humanity actually respected itself enough on a collective level that there wouldn't be such attacks. But that's an idealistic world, and I don't have the luxury of living in that world.

Neither did the 4 dead people in Haiti.

Instead, I asked the person what they thought of Hurricane Dennis and how the CARICOM region was reacting. They had no idea about what I was speaking of. Within their own region, they had no knowledge of what was happening while they continue reading opinions of what has already happened. Like spectators at the coliseum, they look for the most bloody spectacle that doesn't affect their region. That people within our own region will need help after Hurricane Dennis isn't seen as important. Meanwhile, oil prices increase, floods are in Jamaica, and so forth.

What does this say? It says to me that the traditional media in the region is failing to put news that is of local interest to the fore. It tells me that the people who are suffering and will continue to suffer from the effects of Hurricane Dennis had the greater misfortune of having it happen while the violent soap opera between politically motivated groups fights for dominance.

Like an exclamation mark, the London bombing has entered the discussion of the issues of Iraq and terrorism. Like a period, the London bombing rests on the people of the Caribbean region.

Both issues are large issues. But why is it that the Caribbean media focuses on the issues that do not directly involve the Caribbean? Why is it that they do not focus more on what is happening within the region - to our neighbours beyond the fences of ocean? Are they simply relays of the media of the United States and United Kingdom? Are the value of the lives of people in London greater than the value of our own neighbours here in the Caribbean?

And what of Latin America? Are the people in the Caribbean unimportant? The local traditional media seems to have lost focus on the Caribbean region - if it ever had it at all. This leads me to wonder what people of the Caribbean see as their status within the global community.

Most of the time people follow the crowd, paying attention to the things that are loudest. But shouldn't one's neighbours be loudest? Shouldn't we be concerned about what is happening to people of our own region more than that of other regions, where the 'War on Terror' hasn't had any effect other than cut down tourism and increase oil prices?

London's bombing is important. But so are the natural disasters in the region which mean that our neighbours mean assistance. We can't do much about the bombing in London except express condolences. Meanwhile, a few hundred miles away, people from our own region are under attack from something even more primal than mankind's capacity to hurt itself.

We now return you to CNN, where Hurricane Dennis is a sideshow until it destroys a few million dollars worth of property in the United States.