PressEthic

Several times over the last couple weeks, while reading the media's extensive coverage of Katrina, I've had this odd sense of deja vu. Many of the stories read like I've heard them before. And indeed, in a sense, I have. On July 26th (of this year), Mumbai, India's commercial capital, was flooded by unseasonable levels of rainfall. Well, technically, it wasn't the rainfall alone that caused the chaos and the loss of over a 1000 lives (in Mumbai and in the rest of the state of Maharashtra, collectively). There were other factors, including the lack of proper drainage that caused the water to collect rather than flow out with low tide (Mumbai is basically an island off the west coast of India).

In the case of Mumbai, as with New Orleans, there was much praise for members of the media after the disaster. They truly rolled up their trouser legs and waded right in there. They were angry, they demanded answers and they served the people. They brought information to light that made citizens gasp at the level of government carelessness. In the case of Katrina, it was already known that the levees might not withstand the intensity of a hurricane of that magnitude -- and yet nothing was done. In the case of the Mumbai floods, it was common knowledge amongst environmentalists and government officials that the Mithi river, which overflowed its banks and thus contributed in large part to the problem, was in a precarious position -- and yet nothing was done. The media did play a large role in bringing these facts to the people, as it should.

However, I think there is a question that begs to be asked. And that is: if this was all available knowledge, why wasn't the media raising questions about these issues before the onset of a major catastrophe? It's all very well to rush to the scene and do heart-felt and in-depth reporting on a huge story, which is inevitably what natural disasters are. But where were they before these stories became huge, but were nevertheless important? I'm not sure that the media (in either instance) was truly fulfilling its role as the watchdog of society.