by Kevin Walker
University of California, Berkeley
October 16, 1990
Local news organizations work hard to beat other news organizations to a story. There is constant competition between organizations, especially television news teams in the same market, to be the first to break a story, and once done, to shout that fact to the world in the most vivid and attention-grabbing way possible. With the use of poilce scanners and other communications devices, reporters can learn early on about a breaking story, and arrive at the scene quickly, while some action is still occurring. A crisis provides an ideal opportunity -- a dangerous situation that they are able to broadcast as it happens; a chance for a reporter to see if they measure up to that God of journalists, Edward R. Murrow, and a chance for a news organization to win some award for timely and necessary journalism.
Such a crisis arose on the morning of September 27, when a man took several hostages at Henry's Bar in Berkeley. It was almost an ideal crisis for TV, and if it had occurred at 5 p.m., it would have received much more air time. KPIX-TV was among the first news organizations to arrive on the scene, and began broadcasting as soon as possible. But in its eagerness to give viewers as many details as possible, KPIX revealed the presence and location of the police SWAT team, and some police observations about the hostage-taker -- while all the while, he was watching the whole thing on TV. The information broadcast apparently made him angrier than he was. A hostage later chastised KPIX for endangering the lives of hostages, and KPIX's general manager apologized, saying, "We now see that this was a serious error in judgement and as a result, we are reviewing policies of our news coverage to better guide us in terrorist situations." The station also promised to consult with police for future guidelines.1
This incident raises the question, What effect does media presence have on such situations? To answer this, it is instructive to look at a couple of other incidents that, while different in context, raise similar questions.
Take, for example, events earlier this year in New York City. In the course of two weeks last May, a murder trial and a boycott raised similar questions. As the trial of two white men, indicted for the murder of a black youth in Bensonhurst, progressed, blacks from the victim's neighborhood held their own trial on the courthouse steps -- and found the defendants guilty. The prosecutor was a media-hungry reverend named Al Sharpton. He and his followers used the television cameras to state their claim -- "Guilty, or else!" The New York Times, reviewing the spectacle, observed:
Coverage of the boycott of a Korean-owned grocery store was much the same, with dramatic footage of people shouting and threatening eachother, but little inquiry or perspective. The presence of television cameras got to be such an incitement that camera crews soon brought guards to protect them. Two additional facts should be noted: (A) Sharpton was the designated spokesman for the Bensonhurst victim's family; and (B) it was "sweeps month" for the TV stations. Did the presence of TV heighten racial tensions? Were tensions inflated by the stations for the sake of ratings?
Consider the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Scotland last year. The most memorable image of the coverage involved a woman whose daughter was on the flight. She found out, on-air, and crumpled to the floor of Kennedy airport in screaming, sobbing grief. The same station that shot the footage obtained, quite by chance, a list of Syracuse students on the flight, and broadcast them, before any of the victims' families had been notified. Did the station exploit the suffering of the victims and their families for the chance to broadcast the event first, or most vividly?
One final example will suffice. Last year's earthquake in the Bay Area was a true prime-time crisis for the media. Reporters were dispatched all around the region, but most coverage focused on those sites that provided the most vivid pictures, the burning Marina district of San Francisco and the collapsed freeway in Oakland. Some news organizations were accused of impeding the way of rescue workers. The night after the quake, Dan Rather was at the collapsed freeway, and he said, "What television does is take you there." Then he interviewed a young man who had been inside. The young man told Rather he had seen "body parts," and, when Rather further egged him on, he told how he had seen a quivering brain on the road, reminding Rather that he had insisted. A few months ago, a movie aired on cable's USA Network that dramatized the events after the earthquake. It was shot in a verite fashion, and combined actual news footage with reenactments. It was quite realistic and well-made, but received little advance publicity in the Bay Area. Did the media affect events after the quake? Did it distort what happened or exploit the tragedy of the disaster?
The answer to all the above questions is, of course, yes, and the thread running through all the examples is sensationalism. But contrast the latter two examples with the events in New York and Berkeley. In all these instances, the media affected how the event was perceived; in the New York and Berkeley situations, the media had a direct effect on the events themselves. Further, the New York events were essentially staged for the purpose of drawing media attention; the Berkeley hostage incident was spontaneous. Or was it? The point is, how do the media decide which events to cover? How much should they get involved? How should the coverage be framed? And what are the effects of the presence of the media?
I put these questions to Aileen Alfandary, an anchor and news director at KPFA News. KPFA is a radio station, but it covers many events, both planned and spontaneous, including many that other stations don't cover. Naturally, she said, what gets covered depends entirely on the event, and news directors determine which ones by their "news value." Regarding the events at Henry's Bar, she said that although it was a newsworthy event, with local and sensational appeal that is suited for TV, she believed there wasn't really a necessity for continuous live coverage, as KPIX was doing. "I'm not sure it was a story that warranted that kind of coverage," she said, but conceded this is a decision based on a news director's judgement.3 However, if KPIX was aware of the volatility of the situation, it made an error in judgement. As a result, it could have had an undesirable effect on the outcome of the situation. Fortunately, the consequences were not worse.
In the case of the earthquake, the media actually seem to have had a positive effect by their omnipresence. "We had an occasion for everybody living in the area," Alfandary said, "where TV and all the media were a vital lifeline for people." KPFA, like many media in the area, went on live and continuously, (as long as supplemental power supplies dictated). "What people said about the tone of our coverageÉ was that it was calm, and that was helpful, in the midst of such a terrifying experience."4 This was true of all the local media. U.C. Berkeley's Todd Gitlin made some profound observations on the quake coverage. Although there were sensational aspects, he says, like repeated showings of the worst-hit areas which made events seem worse than they were, the overall presence of the media had a soothing effect:
To make the world seem and sound noble and potentially if not presently masterable, we tend to look to the tube, not to political leaders. Amid Californians' own unnerving blitz, the calming voice of a Winston Churchill was not available for inspiration. Local officals had their hands full. It was the steady voices of TV and radio news personnel that we turned to.5
For such spontaneous events, television news can have a positive effect, depending on the choices made by local news directors, and in fact, several Bay Area news organizations won awards for their quake coverage. The event was explloited by national news and a national cable network. In the case of Henry's Bar, it was simply a case of an unwise decision made by the news team -- a mistake. It may be that some company is negotiating for movie rights for the Henry's Bar story. This would not be surprising, as it has been done with so many other such tragedies. But ultimately, the choice of stories to cover and the degree of involvement are choices to be made by local news directors.
As for the nature of coverage, this, being a content issue, is protected by the First Amendment. Regardless of how tasteless may be a TV movie on the quake or a close-up of a victim's sobbing mother, these are protected and will continue to be used, because local news directors as well as network programming executives know that emotional pictures appeal to viewers.
As Barbara Matusow noted in an article in The Washingtonian, "Much of the country is used to sensationalism on local television newsÉ The hot reporter today is the one who's chasing ambulances, digging into civic corruption, or showing up first at the fire. And scanner freaks, who never venture far from their police and fire radios, are in great demand."6 Crime stories, she notes, are particular ratings-grabbers, and she notes the popularity of pseudo-news shows such as Crimewatch Tonight, and the fact that even Nightline's ratings go up 25-50% when it airs a crime-related episode. This is a "more populist approach, championing the cause of 'the little guy,' chasing police stories."
News organizations will even play up such stories to gain viewers' attention: "The quest for 'exciting' stories inevitably leads to hype and exaggeration."7 Sensational stories also appeal because there is an economic aspect involved -- a major concern for local stations. "To consistently produce interesting, thoughtful reports on housing or schools or jobs would take more reporters than any of the local stations have.... But the outlook is for fewer reporters, not more, as the stations continue to lose audience to cable, VCR's, and independent stations."8 All these factors can be reasoned in the coverage of the Henry's incident by KPIX. This is not to say that sensational reporting is preferable, only that it is inevitable for local TV news, given current conditions.
A final issue concerns events that are staged for the purpose of attracting media attention, as with the New York situations and all boycotts, protests, demonstrations and the like. These are what Daniel Boorstin so accurately described as "pseudo-events." Hostage situations, in many cases, can be included in this category. In the Henry's Bar case, it cannot be conclusively said that the event was staged to attract the media, but certainly the gunman tried to exploit the opportunity when he was aware of the media presence.
News directors are well aware of these, as Aileen Alfandary confirmed: "Once the media shows up at an event it changes the nature of the event, and I think everybody knows that, and I don't think that there's a whole lot that can be done about that. Hopefully, then the coverage deals with the issues behind [the event], but that's the nature of the beast. Frequently these are staged by groups or people that demand media coverage for some reason."9
The question is, where does the press draw the line? Which pseudo-event has sufficient news value that warrants coverage? Obviously, when lives, property or other resources are at stake, the event will be covered. But individuals and groups are becoming increasingly adept at media manipulation, and groups as Earth First! and the Saudi government know how and when to make news, the former by breaking the law and the latter by hiring a P.R. agency. Our own government is quite adept at using the media. The current eagerness "to promote the riveting spectacle of men in combat" by American news media reminds Mark Hertsgaard of the William Randolph Hearst's staging of wars for publicity. "You furnish the pictures," Hearst told Fredrick Remington, "and I'll furnish the war." Hertsgaard accuses the U.S. media of creating a war hysteria without sufficent focus on other options. Viewed in this light, it could be said that the media have a definite effect on the Persian Gulf crisis by their very presence.
But in general, the main point is that the decision what to cover, how and when to cover it, is a decision best left to news directors. The Henry's incident, and a few others, show that sometimes the media can affect an event, but to try to bar them or shape their coverage is an infringement on free speech and free press rights. Instead, the press must know of their effects, know about pseudo-events, know how their coverage affects public perceptions, and take responsibility for their decisions and actions. As Gitlin observed, "Television has remade the cultural landscape. Nowadays, disasters happen twice -- first live, then on television. As with assassinations, hostage crises and other unscripted traumas, television crowds into experience and reshapes it. Even victims become voyeurs."11
1. Quoted in Lue, Allen. "KPIX Admits Problems With News Coverage." The Daily Californian, Oct. 5, 1990, 1:1
2. Jones, Alex S. "2 Weeks' News: Sizzle Over Substance." New York Times, May 19, 1990, I, 26:1.
3. Interviewed by me Oct. 15, 1990.
4. Ibid.
5. Gitlin, Todd. "Gauging the Aftershocks of Disaster Coverage." New York Times, Nov. 12, 1989, II, 13:1.
6. Matusow, Barbara. "If If Bleeds It Leads." The Washingtonian, January, 1988, p. 102.
7. Ibid, p. 106
8. Ibid, p. 107
9. Interviewed by me Oct. 15, 1990.
10. Hertsgaard, Mark. "The First Casualty: Press Skepticism is Still the First to Fall Whenever U.S. Troops are Mobilized." Image, Oct. 14, 1990, p. 6. (Supplement to Sunday San Francisco Examiner/Chronicle)
11. Gitlin, 1989.