Remember that recent burst of coverage about the Vatican being interested in aliens and, thus, the question of whether little green men would, or would not, have eternal souls?
Would cavemen need to repent?
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Awe struck? Share it.
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Frame of mind
One of the most important ways in which stories favor one perspective or another is in how they are framed. Which "side" of an issue does a story begin with? How is that side presented? After story selection itself (deciding which stories to report on and which to bypass), framing is one of the most important decisions journalists make. I thought of that when reading this highly informative piece in the Chicago Tribune:
If ever Carol Gaetjens becomes unconscious with no hope of awakening, even if she could live for years in that state, she says she wants her loved ones to discontinue all forms of artificial life support.
But now there's a catch for this churchgoing Catholic woman. U.S. bishops have decided that it is not permissible to remove a feeding tube from someone who is unconscious but not dying, except in a few circumstances.
People in a persistent vegetative state, the bishops say, must be given food and water indefinitely by natural or artificial means as long as they are otherwise healthy. The new directive, which is more definitive than previous church teachings, also appears to apply broadly to any patient with a chronic illness who has lost the ability to eat or drink, including victims of strokes and people with advanced dementia. ...
Gaetjens, 65, said she did not know of the bishops' position until recently and finds it difficult to accept.
"It seems very authoritarian," said the Evanston resident. "I believe people's autonomy to make decisions about their own health care should be respected."
The story goes on to explain this directive from the bishops and how it would affect Catholic hospitals.
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Parsing the Pope
Whenever Pope Benedict XVI gives a homily or addresses a crowd, it’s always fascinating to see how the media write it up. This week, Benedict addressed the Vatican’s diplomatic corps that, by its nature, dealt a bit with broader political themes. How does a reporter sum up a 3,000-word address or figure out what aspect to focus on? To be sure, it’s a difficult task. The Boston Herald headlined its Associated Press story:
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A scientist who has faith
Chemistry was one of my favorite subjects in high school. There’s just something about discussing the periodic table of elements that makes you feel like Bill Nye the Science Guy. Thus, I was delighted to read this Houston Chronicle profile on James Tour, a successful chemist at Rice University. Okay, I’ve lost some of my chemistry enthusiasm because I forgot most of it, but this profile by Eric Berger is compelling. Tour is among the 10 most-cited authors in the world, and the reporter could have easily focused on his scientific achievements alone. But he doesn’t stop there and weaves in details about how Tour’s faith impacts his science.
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The 'why' of terrorism
Last week I read a Washington Post article about Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian man charged with attempting to bomb a flight to Detroit. In the same way that some media coverage of Ft. Hood shooter Nidal Hasan explored his mental state, this Post article took the clinical approach with Abdulmutallab. Like Hasan, he was lonely and wanted to find a wife.
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On the banks of the Yamuna
The Washington Post foreign service — which thankfully still exists –Â sent out this story on Thursday: “New Delhi’s filth continues to choke once-sacred Yamuna River.” It’s a very interesting and well-timed piece in light of all the talk this week at the U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen about getting better environmental controls in rapidly industrializing countries, particularly in China and India. The story does an excellent job illustrating the environmental problems and challenges in contemporary India. Can’t fault it there:
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Pray the flu away
When I became a parent, I was introduced to a world with a lot of fighting. Not between my husband and me — we get along great. But there can be some pretty serious fights in the Mommy Wars. These range from whether mothers should work outside the home to whether they should breastfeed exclusively. And one of the fiercest debates is over vaccination.
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Embryos on the line
Yesterday, the National Institutes of Health announced 13 new embryonic stem cell lines would be added to the NIH Human Embryonic Stem Cell Registry. President Barack Obama received a lot of coverage for his decision to change President George W. Bush’s policy limiting federal funding for embryonic-destroying stem cell research. The media coverage earlier this year was pretty bad on that point. To review, prior to President Bush there were no federally funded lines. Bush began federal funding of the research — controversial because it destroys human embryos — but ordered that only those lines already in existence prior to August 2001 were eligible for said funding.
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