‘Put me on TV, Mister’

Do tragedy survivors pander to media or seek reality?

A visitor drowns and family members continue calling, seeking articles about the deceased weeks after the death, and weeks after there is anything new to report.

A man is murdered, and when the television reporter arrives at the crime scene, kids jump in front of the cameras, yelling, “Put me on TV, mister. Put me on TV.”

According to experts, there is more than one reason people might want to stay involved as part of the news when others, wracked by grief, might turn inward.

“For one thing, I suspect to a lot of them it isn’t real if it isn’t on television,” said Dr. William Boniface, an author and psychiatrist, who spent some time early in his career on Oahu.

“Also,” Boniface continued, “often when somebody dies abruptly, it’s hard for them (survivors) to accept that it happened. But three to six months after someone has died abruptly” in a car wreck, in the ocean or at the hands of a murderer, the survivors sorely miss the person who is gone and they need to settle their feelings.”

But there are times, such as when a person dies and the incident remains unresolved, or in the case of an unsolved crime, when family members use the media to try and obtain justice. Journalists are seen as allies.

“When the family is not in Hawai`i, the only way to keep track of the bureaucracy is through the media,” said professor Beverly Keever of the University of Hawai`i-Manoa.

Keever mentioned the case of Dana Ireland, a 23-year-old woman who was raped and murdered on Big Island in 1991.

“The police kept saying that they knew who the killer was. But they never made any arrests. Went on for years. The parents, on the mainland, continued to write letters to the editor, kept the case in the public eye, wouldn’t let it be forgotten,” Keever remembered.

And eventually, John and Louise Ireland saw their daughter’s murderer in court. In August 1999, Frank Pauline Jr. was convicted of second-degree murder by a jury of six men and six women.

Ireland’s parents were in the courtroom to see justice done almost eight years after their daughter was murdered.

The surging popularity of “reality” television may be a factor in people seeking out the media after tragedies. These shows are number-one with people who have never taken a walk in the woods around their homes.

“When I was in grade school, walking home, at least half the front porches were filled with people. Everything happened on the street in front of everyone. But since the advent of television, people sit in their homes with their back to the street, watching television. The streets have a deserted feeling, and what’s on your television seems more real. There is the feeling that maybe if you are not on television, you are not real,” Boniface speculated.

The sinking in February of a Japanese fishing vessel in a collision with a Navy submarine off Oahu has been followed by repeated televised coverage of weeping relatives and countrymen of the nine killed victims. But Keever thinks there is more to it than playing to the camera.

“I don’t think Americans appreciate the extent of anti-American feeling in parts of Asia,” Keever said. She noted recent trouble in Okinawa involving American servicemen who brutally raped a child.

“It can seem to be a kind of a pattern. The carelessness, the swaggering around,” Keever said.

Still, it can’t be denied that more and more people live vicariously through celebrities and the omni-present media instead of doing their own living.

Even relatives of murder and accident victims seem hypnotized by the attention of the media, and some just keep coming back for more, no matter how unseemly their behavior looks to an outsider.

What is happening to us? What is wrong?

A perfect example of this new American is John Hinckley Jr. He was so sure that actress Jodie Foster would love him if he could just get her attention. So he shot a president: Ronald Reagan.

He didn’t get Jodie, but he did get famous. He became a celebrity of sorts. Recently, the New Yorker magazine wrote about his “girlfriend,” someone who contacted him after he became known for his only accomplishment – trying to kill a president.

Brian De Palma, the famous film director, wasn’t surprised by Hinckley’s attempt to make something of himself. He is quoted in Richard Schickel’s book, “Intimate Strangers, the Culture of Celebrity,” as saying, “I think there are a lot of psychopaths out there watching television…They say, `Hey, what am I doing in this motel room when I could be out there killing people…and being a celebrity.'”

Recent studies claim the average American spends six to seven hours in front of the television daily.

If celebrity is the focus of our lives, observors say, then being on television or in the papers assumes a much greater importance than it did for our grandparents, whose lives revolved around their families, neighbors and jobs. Real things.

Neal Gabler, in his book, “Life the Movie – How Entertainment Conquered Reality,” places much of the blame on television.

“As it polished, processed and packaged reality into news, television wound up integrating life and entertainment more thoroughly…than any previous news vendor ever had or could,” Gabler wrote.

Talking about television news magazines, which newspapers now copy, Robert Hughes, the Australian-born critic who briefly worked for ABC’s “20-20,” said, “Above all (on television news shows), there was the belief (by producers) that reality must always take a back seat to entertainment, so the audience must not be overtaxed, so that they will come back for more of the same Twinkie.”

And if watching others is exciting yet also “fun,” how much more exciting and “fun” would it be if you were the star, or at least a bit player in whatever media is available to you?

Based on the observations of media critics and others, this is the possible answer that emerges: If it isn’t real until it’s televised or written about, then the odd compulsion to cry on camera and to call reporters and volunteer information about a murdered loved, instead of shying away from such gross publicity, is a bit easier to understand.

But in many cases, no less sad.

Staff writer Dennis Wilken can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 252) and mailto:dwilken@pulitzer.net