Out of the otherwise horrific news reports of the Indian Ocean tsunamis disaster, perhaps the most optimistic news was found in the headlines of Wednesday’s Globe and Mail. Above the fold, in XX point type, Canada’s national newspaper declared that “Donors Swamp Charitiesâ€. Within the body of the story, readers were told of the “phenomenal response†of Canadians. Rarest of all, a spokesman for Medicins sans frontieres declared the amount of money they had received had exceeded their ability to deploy it.
There is no question that the shear magnitude of the catastrophe – upwards of 150,000 lives lost, untold devastation of once arable land and an escalating risk of disease and water shortages – at least in part, accounts for this outpouring of generosity. But this “phenomenal response†goes beyond the disaster itself and reflects the times — and the place — where we live.
At bottom, the public’s engagement with this event and their empathy with the victims can be explained by the nature of media today. In 1976, even more lives were lost in an earth quake in China. But this was before 24 hours news television, digital cameras or the Internet. Accordingly, the ramifications of this calamity were largely out-of-sight and unknown. Today, we are inundated with real time accounts of virtually every grisly detail that occurs, as they unfold.
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