Trivial media pandemonium

With Michael Vick's dog-fighting problems, the country has been fixed on the issue of dog-fighting. At the top of CNN's "Latest News" is a story about the number of pit bulls that are "euthanized" each year.

I bawled my eyes out all day when my dad got rid of our two English springer spaniels when I was 8. Since then, I've been bitten in the butt by a hybrid wolf-dog (65% wolf) and I still have a scar from the "friendly" lab that jumped up on me and then ran its claws down my leg. So maybe I just haven't been given many reasons to like dogs. I say that to acknowledge that I'm not exactly drawn into dog stories.

Still, does it make sense that Americans care more about the abuse of pit bulls than we do about so many other things? I know, considering that I just posted a video on a live reproduction of Super Mario Brothers, it's obvious that I don't think we need to spend all of our time reading about human death and destruction. But my problem with stories like the dog-fighting story is their endless continuation.

The dog-fighting issue is worth highlighting with an article or two. But I wonder how many stories were run on the Second Sudanese Civil War, which just ended two years ago and claimed the lives of nearly 2 million people, displacing 4 million more. A more recent event just last week, the Peruvian earthquake, claimed the lives of at least 540 people, but I haven't read a story on it yet this week. The dog-fighting story, on the other hand, has been running since April and we're still obsessed.

I'm constantly struck with how trivial are the news stories we become obsessed with for weeks on end. They're not always trivial in and of themselves. Dog-fighting alone isn't a trivial issue. But in light of the other things going on in our world, it's grossly menial.

But don't tell Americans that. The recovery of abused dogs is more important than the recovery effort in Winona, MN. And that's just the way it is. I only hope this blog finds a better balance than the media.