From The
Idiot Factor:
For weeks we have seen every detail of the lives
of those 12 boys who were rescued from that cave in Thailand. It was a
remarkable story. It was a story with a happy ending. It was newsworthy. But
where the minute by minute details and day long coverage really worth it?
In the last several years our mainstream news
media seem to look for "heroes" they can honour for various acts of
courage under siege, whether related to weather, terrorism, or just plain old
crime. It's as if our capitalist system has a deficit of heroes to worship and
our mainstream news media is looking to fix that situation. We Marxist
have real heroes who have helped revolutions or have defended the working
class. We don't need cops for that and we don't need to make heroes out of
defenders of imperialism.
There are children in trouble all over the world.
There are refugees, children who go hungry, children who live in deep poverty
or other man-made, and capitalist-made forms of injustice. These children's
stories could easily make good and important news stories. Also, the coach who
took these children into a cave right before the rainy season, did something
very stupid and yet he gets made into a hero.
The following story looks into the hype related to
the kids in the cave story. This story asks a lot of good questions that a lot
of journalists should have been asking.
From NPR:
Like millions of global citizens, Abraham Leno
has been riveted by the story of the 12 boys and their soccer coach trapped in
a cave in Thailand.
"I sat around the radio with my family
and we wanted to hear the recent updates of the kids, every little
detail," he says. "To see all the governments sending their best
divers, giving them equipment, offering their moral support — it was a
beautiful thing to see."
But Leno has another perspective. As a youth,
he spent ten years in refugee camps in Guinea. Now working at the American Refugee Committee,
he wishes that the media had paid more attention to his plight and his fellow
refugees: "It would have shed a better light to create the understanding
necessary to help us."
Others share his concerns. Manyang Reath Kher became a Lost Boy at age 3 and later founded the charity Humanity Helping Sudan.
He says, "I don't want to sound horrible to those kids [in the cave], but
the attention they got, it should be spread around. Give that to other
children, too."
The aid community is grappling with that issue
as well. While they all stress that they were deeply moved by the story of the
boys in Thailand, they raise a point: Can the world bring the same level of
care and resources to other children living in crisis? More than half a
million Rohingya children live in camps in Bangladesh, for
example, and 800 children die of malaria each day.
There are, of course, reasons why the cave
story is so riveting.
For the rest click here.
Story by
Story by
MALAKA GHARIB
/MARC SILVER
Allison Joyce for NPR
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