Syria’s Chemical Weapons, The Media’s Role In Thwarting Assad
Time
If current news reports are accurate, Syria’s beleaguered dictator, Bashar al-Assad, has given the orders to arm a variety of weapons with the lethal nerve agent sarin. Is the media leveraging its power to inform public opinion of the real possibilities of massive deaths in Syria if Assad moves forward with his plan? So far, the answer is a qualified, tepid, maybe.
As of Thursday morning, the home pages of most major news organizations were headlining possible breakthroughs in fiscal cliff negotiations, Princess Kate’s bout with intense morning sickness or Apple’s plans to build Macs in the United States. From ABC News to CNN to MSNBC, few editors were choosing Syria or sarin for lead stories. Not that Syrian crisis stories weren’t there at all; they were just buried beneath domestic news and entertainment fluff. The Huffington Post, for example, did feature Assad’s threat on their World page, but their front page headline was all fiscal cliff.
According to this morning’s Washington Post, the United States and Russia are probably the only two nations with sufficient leverage and military might capable of thwarting Assad’s plans—but that effort will require both nations to work in concert, and quickly, to convince the Syrian dictator not to use chemical weapons.
CBS News gave good page placement to Margaret Brennan and Tucker Reals’ story on Hillary Clinton and Russia’s Sergey Lavrov’s latest meeting in Dublin, bringing a tighter focus attention on the eleventh-hour crisis ticking away in Syria.
Russia has been protective of Assad so far, but its loyalty to the Syrian regime appears to be dwindling. A full-court press by the media, suited up in protective gear and prepared to document Russia’s fingerprints on the chemical weapons triggers, may well finally force Russia to abandon Assad and begin the process of dismantling what The New Yorker calls the Syrian sarin threat.
Move the stories above the fold, place them on every home page and lead every news blog with this grave danger. By keeping the pressure on—fueled by hard-hitting stories and persuasive pictures—when diplomacy fails, as it might, the power of the press may well save the day, and the lives of countless innocents.
Share this article
You might also like:
Comments
Latest Posts
Facebook Studies Marriage Decisions
May 18th, 2013As a twentysomething woman, I’m always interested to see–when female friends get married–if they make the name change or keep their maiden name.
These days, that decision is usually announced by making it “Facebook official,” by simply changing the relationship status, or changing the last name along with it.
Using these data points, and women’s birth dates, Facebook analyzed what percentage of women from different age groups are taking their husbands’ last names, hyphenating their names or keeping their maiden names. The results were announced on the Facebook Data Science page this week.
Tumblr to Yahoo: Make My Day
May 17th, 2013Is the social blogging site Tumblr about to sell out?
Ad Week’s Mike Shields has the story that Tumblr has been having negotiations about being acquired by Yahoo.
As Shields reports, a deal could make sense for both companies:
“Yahoo is in serious talks with Tumblr to acquire the social blogging site, according to multiple sources familiar with the talks. The deal is not done, but could reach as high as $1 billion, Adweek has learned. Allthingsd.com was first to report on the talks between the two companies.”
Trial By Facebook: A Dangerous Virtual Path
May 17th, 2013I’m a criminal for being a woman, a journalist and someone with the temerity to walk into a bar.
In a fascinating study of both Facebook and freedom, Amnesty International New Zealand launched “Trial by Facebook,” which examines your profile, scours your timeline and “interrogates” yourfriends to find out what you’d be punished for posting, all around the
world. The app came out several months ago, but it’s been making waves
online this week.
Using my own Facebook page as a guinea pig, I found myself convicted 161 times, in 73 countries, for 13 crimes. Literally dodging a bullet, the
contents of my profiles weren’t tawdry enough to get me beheaded or shot dead, but I would be killed by extremists 22 times, sexually assaulted 16 times, imprisoned 58 times and beaten 73 times–and that’s just the beginning of the terror.
Google Plus Pointers, Twitter Fools
May 16th, 2013Tatiana Aders of Social Media News has made my day. If you don’t quite get how to use Google Plus, help is here:
“Google Plus has some of the most robust posting & sharing capabilities of any social network. From rich snippets to photo editing to individual circles, there are so many features that can make your post stand out from the pack. Here are some highlights from a cheat sheet that I built to get the most out of Google Plus posts.”
LinkedIn’s Latest Edict: Hookers Not Welcome
May 16th, 2013Attention ladies of the night and other interested parties: LinkedIn is taking a harder stance against prostitution.
As Mashable noted this week, the job-networking site has altered the language of its user agreement to expressly prohibit people from promoting escort services or prostitution on its pages.
