Murdered Sleep

photo: Laurent Errera from L'Union

There is too much intention in the flight path of the missing Malaysian Airlines jet for there to be any doubt of terrorism. First it makes a jagged turn off its normal course over the South China Sea toward the Strait of Malacca and then according to the analysis of radar makes a dramatic descent. Considering these facts, it’s surprising there’s a question that someone or thing was directing the plane off its normal trajectory. In most cases those responsible for terrorism whether it’s Al-Qaeda or some other group, quickly claim responsibility. It’s part of the political objective associated with the act. But perhaps the case of  MH 370 represents a new kind of terrorism geared at creating a higher level of fear. No one has obviously even hinted at responsibility. So can we be begin to think that the idea is to unleash anonymous terror? The plane has completely disappeared and what greater fear can there be than that of the abyss? Perhaps the new terrorism resides in producing the fear that there will be successions of events that can’t be explained or resolved. You won’t know when or where the next act of sabotage is coming from and there certainly will be no way of understanding it. The rational universe, a world where things make sense, is an antidote to chaos. It’s the reason readers find solace in detective novels and police procedurals. We know that the criminals will be apprehended. We know there are going to be scourges which will kill innocent people. We can predict suicide bombings in certain trouble spots. We can predict certain fault lines in the earth’s crust and the affect of climate change on sea levels. At least we know the etiology. We’ve made our bed and now must sleep in it. This new brand of anonymous terror is guaranteed to murder sleep.

Newsmongers

In the l976 film Network, Peter Finch, played an anchor named Howard Beale who famously implores his viewers to stick their heads out the window and scream, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore.” Fat chance we're going to find any Howard Beales in today’s competitive news environment. How refreshing it would be to encounter an anchor who threatened to commit suicide on the air! Most of what we hear on the news is enough to drive audiences to suicide, if not drink. The elation accompanying the coverage of the disappearance of MH 370 on CNN is palpable as the networks ratings have benefited from the plane’s uncanny demise (“CNN’s Rating Surge Covering the Mystery of the Missing Airliner,” NYT, 3/17/14). Just a normal crash would not have made for what has become a television phenomenon. No this one has been a real doozy with no black boxes or debris in sight. The MH 370 phenomenon lies at the crossroads of aviation and television and if it continues will spurn a new academic major. The least that can be said is that the rate of increase of an anchor’s salary is directly proportional to the percentage of loose ends that remain from a catastrophe. Conversely, what is death to any network is the absence of bad news. God forbid the remains of the missing plane are ever found, the ratings will plummet. Human interest stories about boy scout troops saving endangered owls create such an obvious level of depression in broadcasters that many of them look they are already on one of the new generation of serotonin reuptake inhibitors. Television, like life, is cruel. And a period of peace and prosperity with no planes mysteriously disappearing is anathema to news executives and anchors both. Right now with the missing plane, the sunken South Korea ferry and the threat of civil war in the Ukraine, news people are having a feeding frenzy. Just look at the shit-faced grins on their faces as they report all that is wrong with the world.