Dear Editor,
I was extremely disturbed to see the article titled “4-year-old killed” displayed over most of the front page of Saturday’s paper. I don’t see the reason to put such news on the front page. If it’s to sell newspapers, as my husband suggested, you didn’t succeed with this reader. I was so upset by it, maybe because I have a 4-year-old, that I just pitched the whole paper in the trash.
I’m a careful reader in that I choose what articles or books to fill my mind with. But when articles are placed so largely on the front page that it’s the first thing to hit you when you look at it, then that’s what I find disturbing. Please consider more carefully what you put on the front page, I know I would greatly appreciate it. There HAS to be more worthy things to report on!
Thank you for your time in reading this. I hope it is as disturbing to you to know how upset one of your readers is, as I was disturbed about Saturday’s front page.
– Robin Bergmann, Akron
Robin: First of all, I want to thank you for writing such a thoughtful e-mail. I agree the media often do fail to understand how they affect people.
However, this isn’t one of those cases.
Frankly, I’m glad you were disturbed by this story. I mean that with full respect for your feelings. I was equally disturbed when I saw the Aug. 10 story about the killing of the 4-year-old, allegedly by foster siblings.
However, I wouldn’t have changed a single thing on that front page. That’s because it is sometimes a newspaper’s duty to upset its readers.
Frankly, this senseless killing horrified me. I have two daughters, and I can’t comprehend how terrible this must have been for the poor little girl. She was punched and kicked until she died, all because she was crying.
I don’t understand how this can happen.
This year, the Beacon Journal is running a series of stories called Kids First. Why? Because our kids our dying — they are being killed by parents, by the boyfriends of mothers, by being left in sweltering hot cars, and now, according to the police, by other kids in the house.
If you don’t think this is a problem of huge proportions, just talk to the folks at Children’s Hospital Medical Center of Akron. They will tell you they’ve never seen anything like it. It’s why children’s health and safety issues have received so much coverage in the past couple of years.
It would be easy to bury these stories on inside pages, as you suggest. Except, that wouldn’t be the responsible thing to do.
Instead, these stories go to the top of the front page where no one can ignore them. The editors want everyone to read them, to be disturbed by them. In fact, they want people to be so disturbed that they do something about it.
When I hear “disturbed,” I’m reminded of the story on extreme motorcyclists and the public outrage aimed at the paper and the police. As I’ve said in previous columns, I think some of the criticism was merited.
But let’s put things in perspective. Which issue has the greater impact on our community: motorcycle mania or the safety of our children?
The extreme-bikers story produced a huge outcry. Shouldn’t we be hearing that every time another child dies needlessly? Shouldn’t deaths concern us more than daredevils?
I say, absolutely!
Your husband suggested the paper’s motive was to sell more newspapers. I’ve heard this “do-anything-to-sell-papers” claim many times, and each time I’m puzzled. It must be a byproduct of television fiction.
True, a newspaper must sell newspapers to stay in business. No one denies that. But no responsible journalist would advocate abusing readers in the name of newspaper sales. It doesn’t make any sense.
I’d like to invite you and your husband to one of the paper’s daily news meetings. You can meet the editors who decide on the stories for the front page. You can see how the process works. You can even voice your opinions.
Perhaps then you will see that disturbing readers often is the right thing to do. Perhaps then you will join in the fight to save our children.
– Mike Needs, Public Editor
