Friday 29 January 2010

Surreal bulletin

Listening to the 6pm news bulletin last night was a surreal experience, in fact I questioned if it was April Fools day. It began with the shocking revelation from Toyota that some of their cars, but they didn’t know which, had problems with the accelerator sticking. I couldn’t help giggling at this, and if it weren’t so serious, I’d have enjoyed a good belly laugh – more on the damage to their brand later.

There followed a report about a guy prosecuted by the police for blowing his nose in his car – in stationary traffic – with the cars handbrake on – because he was not in control of the vehicle!

Next came a bulletin about Tesco in Cardiff banning locals from shopping in their PJ’s. Apparently many of them have taken huge offence at being told to get dressed, feeling its perfectly OK to pop in for their morning paper and packet of fags wearing nothing but their pink chiffon nightdress, or barefoot in their stripy PJ bottoms.

The final bulletin concerned the tragic event of the young children found in sports bags in the back of their Mothers car. Talk about a contrast of bulletins – if this weren’t heart-rending and horrific an event on its own, the impact following such frivolous news events seemed in many respects to be so badly positioned by the producers. It really troubled me that such little thought had been given to effect on the listener. Have we really become so desensitised to the horrifying story of small children being murdered and bundled into sports bags that producers feel a bulletin on chavs shopping in PJ’s is a natural link to child murders?

Dear Lord, I hope not

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