It's just that people are idiots. Plain and simple.

...until the next outbreak, and then its business as usual - EVERYBODY PANIC.

CNN didn't create anything. CNN sells a product. They report on news that people want to watch. If people weren't glued to their sets and the website 24/7, waiting for an update of more deaths and catastrophe, CNN wouldn't play the crap 24/7.

The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

Then they can report on whether or not they were reporting the reports reportedly.

SchlingFocker: CNN didn't create anything. CNN sells a product. They report on news that people want to watch. If people weren't glued to their sets and the website 24/7, waiting for an update of more deaths and catastrophe, CNN wouldn't play the crap 24/7.

The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

Well, if the medium is the message as some people believe, it doesn't really matter what people watch, does it?

SchlingFocker:

The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

Agreed. We mock CNN for "hard-hitting journalism" on inane topics, yet we unwittingly support it by linking it to Fark or even reading it on our own. In short, we get the government media we deserve. If we just stopped watching them (and FOX, and other assorted trash), they'd eventually have to resort to straight journalism in order to win viewers. Well that, or the whaargarble really gets turned up.

Bonus from tfa:

"Flu Virus Sparks 'Social Distancing' Trend."

I'm not sure when I last tuned to CNN. Probably some time a couple of years ago by accident. Same goes for Fox News, et al ;)

SchlingFocker: The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

When the "news" spends it's day scaring everyone, people will get worried and panic. I bet all the "news" organizations were happy though, they didn't have to report for a week while they were trying to scare everyone.

Everybody panic so we can report on the panic please k thx!

My pet pig has the chicken pox.

Im running a fever, have aches, and coughing so I am getting a kick out of .....


/got nothing
//surrounded by schools shutdown in texas
///mmmmmmmm swine

You would think that people wouldn't be so worried knowing that there is a flu outbreak, oh I don't know, EVERY SINGLE YEAR

Doesnt the media always do this? Something happens, they report on it 24 hours a day for a week, and then ask if the media has covered it too much. Seems to be procedure at this point.

After a week of headlines about the H1N1 virus, or swine flu, many emergency rooms and hospitals are crammed with people, many of whom don't need to be there.

It's probably wrong of me to imagine a button on the wall just beyond the outside door. One that activates the canisters in the ceiling? Yeah, I should probably seek help.

Eunuch Provocateur: You would think that people wouldn't be so worried knowing that there is a flu outbreak, oh I don't know, EVERY SINGLE YEAR

Two actually. One in each hemisphere.

Stay Cool Babylon: SchlingFocker:

The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

Agreed. We mock CNN for "hard-hitting journalism" on inane topics, yet we unwittingly support it by linking it to Fark or even reading it on our own. In short, we get the government media we deserve. If we just stopped watching them (and FOX, and other assorted trash), they'd eventually have to resort to straight journalism in order to win viewers. Well that, or the whaargarble really gets turned up.

Bonus from tfa:

"Flu Virus Sparks 'Social Distancing' Trend."

I never watch the Fox News cable channel, so I'd say the latter part seems to be happening (whaarbargarble) more often, at least going by Fark submitted stories on the Politics tab.

Eunuch Provocateur: You would think that people wouldn't be so worried knowing that there is a flu outbreak, oh I don't know, EVERY SINGLE YEAR

Yes, but it's the SWINE FLU!!!111!!!!OMGWTFBBQ!1!!!1!!!!!

And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn't there? Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who's to blame? Well certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you're looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn't be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to the now high chancellor, Adam Sutler. He promised you order, he promised you peace, and all he demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent.

Being extremely important, like most Farkers, I work at a convenience store called Mac's in Canada.

I have spent the last week telling stupid people a) bacon doesn't spread swine flu b) It has damn near a 0% mortality rate in the first world, and c) For some reason, pandemic is a seriously cool word that people just like to bandy about as if it actually means something related to morbidity.

The two important quotes to refresh,
They said that a black man would be president when pigs fly, well 100 days into his office swine flu
and
One death from swine flu leads to a million facemasks. A million deaths from AIDS leads to one condom.

Why yes I work graveyards and drink antisocially during the day, how can you tell?

BACON!

/2nd image on GIS

Pandemic, Mr news guy I don't think that word eans what you think it means.

Follow the money. Always follow the money. And where does the money lead? Straight to Stephen King. Sales of "The Stand" are off the charts.

I called this early.

Where is my cookie.

SchlingFocker: The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

The viewers of CNN that actually believed it, a minority of a minority. Of the hundreds of people I know, there is. . . exactly one person who is freaking out. Even my health nut mom hasn't said anything about it. I was half expecting she'd call me to be careful or something.

No, there is no news here. The media hyped up a story about how scary swine flu is, believed it themselves, and is now making a story about their story. And OK, everyone has a crazy aunt or two that believes every scare on TV, totalling some million in the country, so of course you'll see some masks here and there and mask sales are up. but really, the rest of the world goes on.

It's emotional masturbation. They really are that full of themselves. The TV news media has been an incestuous nepotistic dysfunctional clusterfark for so many years that every single one of them is insane. So let's not give them the credit they deserve. If you think they reflect the majority of society, you'll go nuts. Instead, just look around you. Most of the country isn't in a panic. TV media is just not that influential anymore, and considering how dumb they are, that's a good thing.

what irks me is that people in the media cnn, fark. everybody is polarized over this issue, and completely missing the point

"EVERYBODY IS GOING TO DIE- SWINE FLU IS END OF DAYS"

"snark snark snark, swine flu is harmless, i've seen castrate guinea pigs more dangerous than swine flu"


and you're both wrong. When an influenza virus crosses species it is ALWAYS cause for concern. It is rare for flu to cross species and when it does, it often leads to realllly infectious strains. Those strains can become more deadly with additional mutations. Mutations in viruses that have already crossed species are common.

currently, swine flu is pretty indolent, and hasn't been killing many folks so there is no need for panic. At the same time, it has the potential to be very dangerous, and the situation needs to be followed with intense scrutiny to avoid a public health crisis.

The goal of the media in an ideal world would be: informative, caution inspiring, but not panic inducing. The media sucks at being subtle. Big surprise.

dragonchild: Most of the country isn't in a panic.

I know this.

TV media is just not that influential anymore, and considering how dumb they are, that's a good thing.

If nobody was watching them, and they weren't getting the ratings, they wouldn't have the money to stay in business.

The truth is that, while people may not believe what they say, a shiatload of people still watch, just hoping to see things go to shiat.

So, how long until martial law is declared?

SchlingFocker: If nobody was watching them, and they weren't getting the ratings, they wouldn't have the money to stay in business.

Yeah, but it's a bubble economy: half of it exists only because they believes it does. I daresay most people who watch TV watch shows (not news), leave it on to spook burglars, or just have it on as background noise. The days of the TV as a second shrine are long gone, and the networks yearn for what will never be again.

So yeah, the TV gets used. That won't go away. Yet they manage to get advertising dollars because they can still convince companies and campaigns to cough up money for TV time, and that won't change quickly, either. In reality, the ratings are about as meaningful as a WoW quest. They require suspension of disbelief, and anyone who takes them very seriously has issues. Which is anyone involved in TV at all.

The office building I work at has a contract to run Fox News on the TV 24/7. I'd bet anyone a sammich there's a Neilsen box in there.

Find out if you have swine flu here. (new window)

/Was shocked to find out that I do

My parents are freaking out too, buying handi-wipes and masks, I told them they were stupid to buy into the media fear-mongering and hung up on them.

//got nothing else...

Oldiron_79: Pandemic, Mr news guy I don't think that word eans what you think it means.

I know it's just a typo, but now I want "eans" to be a verb. I just need help with the definition.

/it eans me so.

Tirgoviste: One death from swine flu leads to a million facemasks. A million deaths from AIDS leads to one condom.

QFT. But I'm assuming that people were just as panicked in '81 or so, after the infections were made public but before it was common knowledge that all you needed to do was lay off the bare-backing of junkies and, eventually, just stop having unprotected casual sex altogether. In fact, I remember parents freaking out because one student at (insert school, there were many) had HIV. And this was when it was CLEAR that HIV wasn't something you contracted by shaking hands with the gay guy in cubicle #7. In some parts of the country, people still live with a real and lurking fear of HIV based solely on the idea that you can catch it from common contact other than blood-borne transmission.

But yeah, after all of that panic...a whole slew of people still eschew condoms, are discouraged access to them via fundie social engineering, extreme poverty or remote location of certain cultures...whatever the reason, more people are probably NOT wearing condoms than are. What did we learn?

Someone at work asked if I was sick, noting that I sounded congested. In hindsight I should've simply replied "oink."

/OMG EVERYONE PANDEMIC
//Seriously, people are acting like it's the end times

You know I was really hoping for someone to call me out or start a flamewar bored as I am. I'm currently tired of trolling but if you want to take the devil's advocate I promise to make lots of outrageously underinformed statements via logical fallacy for you to mock openly.

Tirgoviste: You know I was really hoping for someone to call me out or start a flamewar bored as I am. I'm currently tired of trolling but if you want to take the devil's advocate I promise to make lots of outrageously underinformed statements via logical fallacy for you to mock openly.

Obama created the swine flu to kill off whites.

There, flamewar started.

fark CNN with a rusty length of razor wire.

Tirgoviste: You know I was really hoping for someone to call me out or start a flamewar bored as I am. I'm currently tired of trolling but if you want to take the devil's advocate I promise to make lots of outrageously underinformed statements via logical fallacy for you to mock openly.

I would, but I have been struck down by an apocalyptic worldwide pandemic which has killed 0.00000000000001% of the entire planet's popultation

boobsrgood: I know it's just a typo, but now I want "eans" to be a verb. I just need help with the definition.

Hmmm.... How about...

eans - Causing strain or discomfort in such a way that the sufferer ends up wearing the tense expression of someone trying really hard to poop. The sufferer also often makes a low groaning noise which sounds like they're saying "eeeeeeaaaaannnnnn".

Example: "Listening to Bill O'Reilly really eans me. Watching 'The View' eans me even more."

As a SARS survivor, I'm getting a kick out of these replies...
/not really
//it was bird flu
///fear is the media's number one export

would a woman of low morals who contracted the swine flu be called a swine-floozy?

"if you increase that volume, you're throwing them right over the edge"

That'd be a good start.

The very nature of medium dictates what works well on it.

watch your sitcoms and dramas and cartoons and comedy, skip the news and mute the commercials. That's about as good as television can get.

find your news elsewhere. Consider a subscription to a print news source. Yes, they too have biases in them, but it is far less damaging and nullifying.

We're a nation of hypochondriacs; the media saturation of the swineflu story is pushing those people right over the edge. We've got local churches holding Mass with surgical masks on, and telling people that if they don't take the offering that's OK. Meanwhile, entire school systems close because one student comes down with the flu, graduations are being held separately for those who went to Mexico recently and those who didn't, and it just feeds on itself. We've even been told at work that anyone exhibiting 'flu like symptoms' should be told to go home immediately and everyone who was near them to go to the doctor "just in case".

SpinStopper: I'm not sure when I last tuned to CNN. Probably some time a couple of years ago by accident. Same goes for Fox News, et al ;)

Me too. That might explain why I have not yet panicked over the swine flu, the economy, the war in Iraq, shark attacks, missing white chicks, child molesters, global warming/cooling/wetting/drying, or any of the other recent panics.

Perhaps I'm in the minority, but I get my information from informative sources.

I read a year ago or so that the *median* age of a CNN viewer is now 60. 60!

In other news, I submitted this with a slightly better headline.

EdgeRunner: Example: "Listening to Bill O'Reilly really eans me. Watching 'The View' eans me even more."

And the latest Nickleback song eaned the hell out of me.

/I like it

SchlingFocker: CNN didn't create anything. CNN sells a product. They report on news that people want to watch. If people weren't glued to their sets and the website 24/7, waiting for an update of more deaths and catastrophe, CNN wouldn't play the crap 24/7.

The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

2/10; not sure what you thought made your post special

strathmeyer

CNN didn't create anything. CNN sells a product. They report on news that people want to watch. If people weren't glued to their sets and the website 24/7, waiting for an update of more deaths and catastrophe, CNN wouldn't play the crap 24/7.

The viewers are as much to blame as CNN is.

2/10; not sure what you thought made your post special

You seriously think that calling the news media out for sensationalism is a troll? I hereby forbid you to ever rate any troll ever. Also, Schling gets some slack because 30% of what he posts is gold.