We live in a world in which yesterday's news is not merely yesterday's news but feels like something that might have happened back in the Jurassic Age!
It is not that all of a sudden we have developed very short attention spans. I suspect that in the old days, like when I was young, news was whatever the editors of newspapers and radio programs decided was worth to pass along to junkies like me. Furthermore, in those dark ages that they were before the internet and the diffusion of liberal democracy, quite a few societies were sealed off, thereby preempting the possibility of knowing what was going on there.
In the contemporary world, it is the other way around. Societies are finding it to be quite a task putting a lid on anything, and everything from the neighborhood car accident to wars are part of the constant streaming of news from which we have to force ourselves shut.
That inundation also means that yesterday's news becomes quickly forgotten.
Like the Malaysia Airline jet that disappeared. Remember that? Do you think that the friends and families of those who have not been heard from have forgotten them? I bet they grieve day in and day out, while the rest of the world has, as they say, moved on.
We moved on to news story of the girls who were abducted in Neigeria by Boko Haram. Remember that? And recall the "Bring back our girls" campaign in which even Michelle Obama participated? We tweeted and updated our Facebook status for a day or two, and then moved on even as the militants continue on with their madness.
These are merely two of the recent ones that we have already forgotten. And then there are the ones from the metaphorical day-before-yesterday. Like that crazy guy in North Korea. Or the maniac in Zimbabwe. Who, you ask? Forget those, because there is a lot more to keep track from today ...
... Like the Iraq story.
Or the Syria story.
Or the Palestine story.
Or the ...
But, of course, a good chunk of the world will have already tuned all these out--there is nothing more important than football now. You think there might be even one in that stadium with a "Bring back our girls" sign? Or with a sign that reads "Stop the Palestinian bombing"?
Perhaps more are grieving the Brazilians humiliating defeat than are the numbers who are keeping a vigil for those kidnapped girls or the perished passengers. We humans are a bizarre kind, to put it in the mildest way. For now, there is one reason we can cite for this lunacy--the supermoon!
2 comments:
Yes, memory is short and getting shorter, unless one is personally affected by the happening. Maybe its an evolutionary defence - if we remembered everything, we would surely go mad.
That is no consolation, of course, for the Nigerian girls or the Malaysian Airline victims ......
Yes, no consolation to the suffering ...
Everyday, every minute, people somewhere are suffering losses of different kinds. Their world changes with that loss, but the rest of us party on. A stark reality that we ought to get used to, and earlier the better--the world, the cosmos, doesn't stop for any one of us and what happens to any one of us is, well, immaterial ...
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