A matter of perspective

The uproar over Fox’s attempt to exploit murder for profit in the case of O.J. Simpson is predictably unexceptional. First, we’re talking about a network that openly, and quite loudly, advocates murder and war crimes on a global scale and actively promotes those who kill and torture hundreds of thousands, probably millions before it’s all done (if ever), and profits from it handsomely, so it figures that they wouldn’t expect any outcry over promoting a solitary killer with only two victims to his credit.

And again it goes to show how we, as a species, lack perspective. Literally millions of people die in stupid wars or famines in Africa, or elsewhere, and we shrug. Yet when bad things happen to people we know – and we got to know poor Ron and Nicole – it is, for us, of paramount importance. And the greater the cultural distance, the less we care. African-Americans care little, if any, more about four million dead in the Congo than whites, but it’s different when someone they can relate to gets killed by a racist in Texas. And not a lot of tears were shed by white Americans when horrible war crimes were committed in Bosnia. We only became involved because the Europeans, who were so much closer, demanded it.

So Fox is exposed, which is a good thing, but I doubt anyone will make the connection between the wrong of profiting from O.J. and the wrong of profiting from the Coulters, Malkins, Hannity’s and O’Reilly’s who would kill millions. Two is a number to which we humans can relate. Numbers become increasingly fuzzy as we add more zeros.