Unit Paper

There isn't an American citizen in the world ho doesn't know of the painstaking terror that swept through the country as we witnessed the scene via the myriad of media coverage on every channel. Watching these news sources and seeing the aftermath, and watching the government response as they tried to figure out why it happened was actually detrimental to the healing process of the country. Hearing the scientists discuss how the towers fell, and listening as the government talked about how these terrorists gained access to the planes Just worked to spread more fear into the minds of the American citizens.Had the media Just gone dark, had the government Just said, â€Å"k, this happened, we need time to clean this up and discuss options, trust us,† Then the country may have been able to relax a little more. American citizen's now have some level of post- traumatic stress simply from being exposed to what was going on in real time. I will never forget the video of the people Jum ping from the buildings before their collapse, or the ash falling like snowflakes, covering everything around the city. I'll never forget the clouds of thick black smoke, and the exact moment that the towers finally elapsed.And I'll never forget the days after, and the images of the towers missing from that NYC skyline. And yet, Vive never even been to New York. The media showed every horrifying angle as things progressed, making it as though we were all standing on the roadway, gazing up at the horrors as they occurred. The news provided every view point and every option, even though 95% of them were speculative and so far from the truth. The terrorists' goal was to make the US fearful of them in order to make their point, and while they did a decent Job of that, the media Just added icing o the cake.For months afterwards, people were too afraid to fly; people were too fearful to use public transportation. This fear was Just perpetuated by the media's involvement. On the opposing e nd of the spectrum, the media can sometimes have a positive effect in minimizing the effectiveness of the terrorist attack. While flying into Boston in April of last year, I was amazed to hear the news of the city being in Lockwood. Sitting outside of Logan airport, the lack of people was eerie, and I pulled up the news on my phone to follow what was going on.The city was in Lockwood and police were requesting that people stay in their homes and off the roads to make it easier to search for the bombing suspect; a nice way of suggesting that Marshall Law was being imposed, but not exactly. The good thing about the media being involved in this was that people quickly heard that they should stay inside, which cleared the roads and made it possible for the police and government to really focus and search for Tsarina's. Would they have found him if they hadn't put the city on Lockwood?Probably, but you can't be certain, ND it was more effective to do so to ensure that he was located as q uickly as possible. Social networking is almost as bad as the media. Daily, there are posts about a child with cancer or a family whose home burned down that are asking people to like the photo. This is all misinformation and useless. Not to mention the things people post about terrorists or even the government, where you can tell that they have heard one thing and assumed the rest. That being said, social networking has a knack for escalating facts really quickly until they are more lie than truth.It's important to be informed, but when you're getting your facts from a post that's majority misinformation, it Just snowballs and leads to a bunch of confusion and panic. That's not always the case, however. Sometimes, social networking can be a fantastic tool when it comes to terrorist activity. The ability to share posts on Backbone, for example, can be an excellent tool if the police are searching for a particular suspect. A picture or description can be released, and people can spre ad it to millions of others in mere minutes.Not Just relating to terrorism, but crime in mineral, this is incredible and has been known to assist with finding many people, suspects and victims. While the media can be a useful aspect when it comes to terrorist activity, it is generally more of a hassle than an aiding tool. It's our civil right to be kept informed on the events in our country, but in times of an attack, our government should focus on responding before they should worry about letting us bystanders know what happened. A terrorist attack is performed with the objective of instilling fear in the targeted audience, and when facts are misconstrued, this is Just perpetuated.