Is Bad Publicity Still Good Publicity?

I've thought about this topic for a few days and today it seems to be setting the online world of media news on fire. This is probably assisted by the reward being offered by famous director and producer Michael Bay on this very topic. On Tuesday it began being reported that there was video on the web showing what many thought was a teenage girl hurling puppies one by one into a river presumably where they died. It did not take long before the web had mobilized in an effort to find this girl along with the person who stood by and recorded these acts. I have a soft spot for animals of just about any kind so although I have been unable to bring myself to actually watch the video I have seen screen shots and read descriptions and heard descriptions of the video and her complete lack of empathy as she was doing this. Initially I wondered how this could have any bearing on this "intro" to digital media course, after some thinking I realized this is exactly what digital media is becoming and what some say media has done to society. As you will see as this course progresses there are critics that would like to say that the media is to blame for the desensitisation of today's youth making them unable to feel empathy to other humans let alone animals. To a degree I can see their point the media never seems to question graphic and violent content. In fact I would put money on it that more complaints are filed about nudity and sexual content in media that are ever filed about violent situations. To me I find this to be a horrible mistake, do I think that children should be exposed to sexually explicit content on a regular basis, no not at all; but at the same time I am more concerned about how violence has become an accepted part of media communication.
I digress is the media to blame for the fact that this young woman didn't care about the innocent puppies that she tossed into the river to die? I don't know, it's possible but doesn't the true responsibility lie within the parents to instill those values of sympathy, empathy and right and wrong in their children. Should parents really leave it up to the media to raise their children? The next point to be made is would we have ever heard about this if not for the world of digital media? I suggest the answer to this is no, thirty even twenty years ago its possible that we would have never known about this situation and the outrage that has followed would be dramatically lessened. PETA initially offered a reward for the identity of this young woman and they were soon followed by director Michael Bay who offered a $50,000 reward to track her down. The current conclusion to this situation is being reported that the teenage girl filmed throwing puppies into the river has been found in the Bosnian town of Bugojno what the outcome from her identification has yet to be seen. Digital media has made it virtually impossible for things to remain secret and people to remain anonymous. If there is a cell phone around you can rest assured that it is possible you are being filmed and people tend to forget that once it goes out onto the world wide web it is out there for anyone to see (whether it be video or photograph). We'll talk in more detail about all of these impacts as the semester progresses but be aware of the vast reach that digital media has and understand this is a media and medium whose power has never been experienced before the way the world sees it now.