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Has media coverage changed natural disasters
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INTRODUCTION There is little doubt that the media has a profound impact on our awareness of humanitarian emergencies and disaster relief around the world. The reality of these disasters, and our responses to them, are heavily influenced by the framework that the media uses – through exposure on television, radio and in print – to capture our attention. The media has a number of important responsibilities during a natural disaster. I have broken down their responsibilities into four stages: early warning, immediate response, post-disaster review, and implementation. While these phases do not necessarily occur one after the other without overlap, they form a good basis from which to explain the different roles of the media throughout the disaster relief effort. First and foremost, in what I like to call the “early warning” phase, the media serves as a link between disaster response units and authorities, with victims of an impending disaster. Their role here is to alert victims of an impending disaster and distribute disaster response advice. After the disaster hits, the next phase is “immediate response”. The media’s primary focus here is to help victims of the disaster. The immediate response phase has two stages: crisis point, where the victims need immediate access to basic essentials; and the rebuilding phase, where victims have their basic needs met but there is ongoing need for donations – more generally in terms of goods and services – to assist victims rebuild their lives. By reporting on stories with dramatic and emotive coverage, the media links local and international NGOs to the public and compels them to donate. In the “post disaster review” phase, the media focus moves away from aid, and takes a more eva... ... middle of paper ... ...plementation of new procedures and policies surrounding disaster awareness and response plans. The media works with NGOs to generate donations and help the victims. It promoted debates around what went wrong, and how to improve next time. Moreover, it puts pressure on the authorities to implement these changes to ensure a decrease in risk for any future disasters. It is true to say that without the media, the success of disaster management would not be possible. When the media, government authorities, technology suppliers, UN agencies, international and national NGOs and local communities work closely together, to inform and educate the public with accurate information, then early warning systems, disaster prevention methods and relief programs will be much more cohesive. Therefore, the role of the media in humanitarian emergencies and disaster relief is paramount.
The proliferation of crises around the world has led to a prominent increase in the amount of humanitarian aid needed. Humanitarian aid work represents not only compassion, but commitment to support innocent populations that have experienced sudden or on-going tragedies. Some of these tragedies include: malnutrition, genocide, diseases, torture, poverty, war, natural disasters, government negligence, and unfortunately much more. There is no doubt that these tragedies are some of the world’s toughest problems to solve as they are often complex, multifaceted and require diligence and patience. For this reason, being a humanitarian aid worker is more than a profession, it is a lifestyle that requires a sharp distinction between one’s work and
Royer, Jordan. “Hurricane Sandy and the importance of being FEMA”, Crosscut.com, Crosscut.com, Web. 1 Nov 2012, 3 May 2014.
There are many areas of the world where the most basic needs like clean drinking water, proper sanitation and medical care are just not available. When disaster strikes, the people living in these already disadvantaged areas are thrust into situations where death is almost always imminent. Reach Out WorldWide (“ROWW”) was started by a group of 6 men in California. They flew to Haiti and volunteered to help in whatever way they could after a massive earthquake devastated the country on January 12, 2010. While working in Haiti as medical aid volunteers, the group recognized the need for skilled people, supplies and urgency for a faster response when natural disasters strike.
The article “When The Media Is The Disaster,” by Rebecca Solnit discusses the accounts that took place with the media and the victims during the Haitian earthquake. People were trapped alive struggling to survive. Many of these victims became so desperate for food and water they began to steal. The mass media interpreted their actions as stealing, characterizing them as “looters”. Solnit does not agree with the media labeling victims as “looters” because victims are being portrayed as something they are not.
News of the devastating hurricane Katrina and its economic, political, social, and humanitarian consequences dominated global headlines in an unprecedented manner when this natural catastrophe struck the region of New Orleans in mid August 2005 (Katrinacoverage.com). As a tradition, large-scale disasters like Katrina, inevitably, bring out a combination of the best and the worst news media instincts. As such, during the height of Hurricane Katrina’s rage, many journalists for once located their gag reflex and refused to swallow shallow and misleading excuses and explanations from public officials. Nevertheless, the media’s eagerness to report thinly substantiated rumors may have played a key role in bringing about cultural wreckage that may take the American society years to clean up.
The natural disaster in 2005 proved to be a major blow to many authoritative figures and organizations. Their failure to responsibly provide citizens’ safety at emergency situations left scars all around the world. The federal government had failed to completely step in when stae and local authorities exhibited minimal signs of motivation to support the city of New Orleans, Louisiana. In response to the film “When the Levees Broke” by director Spike Lee, the documentary clearly displayed the devastating situation that citizens were stuck in, but with few and late assistance from their own governmental representatives, citizens were fighting to survive. To make matters worse, the people were the first in sight to provide assistance to their
Kim, Susan. Disaster News Network Best way to help? 14 August 2004. Web. 2 April 2014.
A systemic crisis is a crisis in which the breadth of impact reaches many individuals within the system; for example, schools, businesses, entire communities, regions, or it may be worldwide. The individuals involved in a systemic crisis can become overwhelmed with the enormity of the situation and need physical and/or psychological assistance to regain control. Systemic crisis interventions require a combination of strategies working cooperatively together across multiple agencies to effectively address all potential needs of the victims. However, not all systemic crises are the same and require interventions that are specific to the systemic crisis category. The following paragraphs will give a brief description of a natural disaster
Governments, the private sector, Non Governmental Organizations and Community Organizations play vital roles in recovery. The essence of a recovery effort is the resources captures to assist, the capability of assistance and other best practices for recovering from a disaster. Rubin and Popkin, (1990) in their report entitled Disaster Recovery after hurricane Hugo in South Carolina thoroughly outline many challenges to which organization and other bodies had face in Hurricane Hugo’s recovery effort. These inefficiencies cause a spiral of increase lost of life, property and livelihood for hundreds of people to which the hurricane affected.
Throughout the recovery period, it is crucial to monitor local media sources for information about where to obtain emergency housing, food, medical, and financial assistance. Direct assistance to individuals and families may come from different organizations such as American Red Cross, Salvation Army, FEMA and non profit organizations. Such organizations can provide food, shelter, essential hygiene supplies and assist in the aftermath clean-up efforts.
Social work interventions in disasters have focused on the variety of ways that such events affect individuals, families, organizations and communities. Areas of concern have included traumatic stress, resources for disadvantaged and vulnerable populations and co-ordination of various intervention systems (Zakour, 1996).
The most effective crisis communicators are those who provide prompt, frank, and full. information to the media in the?eye of the storm? (Semio, 2004). The X-Files. Silence not only angers the media, but also compounds the problem.
Social media has become both popular and crucial in crisis and emergency communications. Responders are not only communicating to their public through social media outlets, the public is communicating with each other, and with responders. Individuals are able to provide important information on disaster impacts, including location and imagery, using nothing more than a smartphone equipped with a camera and GPS locator. One particular technology from Ushahidi offers an interesting way for responders and affected individuals to communicate with one another in the course of a disaster response. The Ushahidi BRCK offers an application of technology that, while not originally designed for use in the emergency management field, has an application in the response to a disaster. This and other technologies contribute to the ever changing way responders and individuals communicate.
Researchers have noticed for as long as the media system dependency theory has been studied that, what people hear, see, and read inflicts an experience on the consumer. It affects their thoughts about the information they have just taken in and allows for judgments to be formed as well as a relationship to the media source itself (Loges & Ball-Rokeach, 1993). We have decided on a qualitative design that will allow us to understand more in depth implications media places on society when devastation hits a country. As a group of researchers we are going to base our research off the exploratory descriptive research. This will allow us to pick and choose which we feel is the best way to attain information we need from media consumers about the event...
report news that is as close to factual as it is. The media news has a tendency to dramatize disaster