In the heat of the Senator Foley scandal I noticed a seemingly odd occurrence. On the cover of Time Magazine, smack in the middle, was the rear view of an elephant. The headline was something to the extent of “The End of the Republican Party.” While the picture was powerful in its starkness of a single elephant on a white background, it was the cover of the New York Times Magazine, a few days later that struck me. On the cover, there was yet another elephant. But this time the image represented an article dealing with the phenomena of endangered elephants. I found it interesting that even though the content was wholly unrelated, the images used were identical.
Upon showing this to my parents, my mother replied, “its zeitgeist.”
Zeitgeist is defined as “a phenomenon based on fate where something simultaneously happens everywhere at a certain time.” My mother informed me, that this is also a concept in media. Frequently, when one issue or image is used, it is used everywhere. When I logged onto CNN this evening, I found myself in another zeitgeist moment.
For the past day and a half, one of the news stories that was inescapable was the story of Sean Bell, a black man who was shot and killed outside a strip bar on the day his honeymoon was supposed to begin. The issue is meriting so much attention because as of yet, it is unclear why he and the other men he was with were shot, resulting in the one fatality. Every news circuit has been carrying this story all day. The grieving mother of his children visited the scene. A vigil was held where the participants counted to the number 50- the supposed number of how many shots the police fired at the men. Reverend Al Sharpton has gotten involved to express his anger. And, even Mayor Bloomberg has expressed the fact that he has found this matter to be “unacceptable.”
My moment of zeitgeist arrived at 9:30 p.m., after my last class, as the CNN homepage appeared on my computer screen. “Stories Differ in Police Killing, Chief Says,” read the headline. At quick glance I assumed this article was about the abovementioned shooting. But no! Unlike the first shooting, which occurred in Queens, New York, this shooting took place in Atlanta, Georgia. Last week, yes, last week, Kathryn Johnston, an 88-year old black woman, was shot and killed by police in a drug raid on her home. On Tuesday the police came to her home. They claim that she opened fire on them and they returned fire, mortally wounding her. Her family claims that this “little old woman” had nothing to do with drugs, nor did she allow other to use her home to sell drugs. Thus an investigation is underway.
I find myself wondering, what brought about the uncovering of this case that occurred earlier last week? Why did the Atlanta police chief announce that an investigation would commence today? In the Sean Bell case, the shooting occurred at 4 a.m. and within a few hours of publicity an investigation was underway!
Is there a relationship between the publicity of the Queens shooting and the surfacing of the Atlanta shooting, which is almost a week old?
Is it zeitgeist?
With this current example in mind, it is interesting to consider what causes zeitgeist. What we know is that the Sean Bell story was a popular story today. People were mobilized to hold a vigil, all the developments on this case were noted on websites, and this story was a top new story on news outlets. As depressing and horrible as it is to imagine, I see no other explanation than going back to our good old profit-seeker model.
Here we had a human-interest story that had all the elements of good news. We had police brutality, death, and a grieving widow. With all the interest it seems that the news wanted to capitalize on this attention, and what better way to do it that by digging up a similar story.
Sad, how two deaths, of which we know little to nothing about, become attempts of news outlets to attract viewers.