Let's Pull the Plug (the Camera Plug)

Watching all the news networks cut live last night to a very staged and dramatic appeal by Mary Schindler that was nothing more than more airing dirty laundry in public (and bringing the name of the other woman in Michael Schiavo's life into the public eye which probably serves little good except perhaps to aim more death threats at this woman, to boot) really should tell every sane person that it's time to pull the (camera) plugs.

On the one hand, we have people screeching down the sage words of doctors who KNOW this case, know that the process Terri is going through is not unusual and not as grizzly as its made to sound, and are getting really tired of having to debate medicine with the likes of Joe ("There's a dead woman staffer in my office soup") Scarbrough and men hell bent on removing our right to choose the conditions of our continued residency on this earth. But on the other - and it doesn't get better - is the circus-like atmosphere around the hospice. If you saw Anderson Cooper touring the site yesterday or today, you see see a strange mix of quacks, charlatans, people there to promote their Christian rock music, or sell t-shirts, and every religious type who has delusions of his (or her) own TV flock sending them huge cash donations and blind ego-boostering faith.

Doesn't the idea of strangers - and the media has recounted many tales of people who never met Terri before traipsing in and out of her room either smuggled in by the Schindlers or who force their way in with food and beverage - all trooping in to see you on your deathbed strike you as more than simply distasteful?

I'm not sure whether news networks are seeing any real ratings jump by concentrating on only two topics: Michael Jackson and Terri Schiavo. But I can say that if we purposely switch programming whenever they present more Cirque de Schiavo, we may send a message.

In fact, I go through a real ethical debate with myself every time I post about this case. It's a non-case (the same sad personal stories so many of us experience) except in what's being forced upon us by a small group of people who want to make it one more wrecking ball into the crumbling walls of individual rights. I try to limit my posts to specific aspects and then to shed light (hopefully) on how the rules are being written and abused to fit specific agendas. Tom DeLay responds to a week of incredible criticism for his lack of ethics by seizing on the Schiavo case as a distraction, then tries to whip up his base of supporters by saying that like poor Terri Schiavo, he is just a victim of the left.

Of course I'm not unaffected by the obvious pain the family (family being the Schindlers and the Schiavos) is experiencing - and not just because it's shoved at me by the media in all directions. But that's just it: it's a personal case where the courts have upheld the decisions in the many actions brought unsuccessfully by the Schindler family. If you read the words of the much-villified Judge Greer in the most recent actions, you get some feeling of how the court came to their rulings.

So perhaps the most merciful thing we can do is to stop breaking into real news - or hell, even interviews with Whacko Jacko - to report each new tear by the Schindler family. They have reason to be sad (although I think their level of both obfuscation and outright lies is above what might be deemed acceptable even in their desperation) and to hurt. Their daughter's body is dying. No one wants that to happen. But it's the same stuff we all experience outside of the cameras.

There is no reason to document just one such case ad nauseum, let alone have the presentation so one-sided (both because Michael Schiavo is focusing on his wife and the situation and not playing to the press and because the media seems to have invested itself in booking 20 fanatics for every sane voice).

Be merciful, CNN, MSNBC and others: pull the Schindler camera plug. They need to accept and to grieve away from the cameras. And we've got much more critical issues - and even more global aspects of this case that what Bob and Mary Schindler want - to cover. And no, that's NOT more coverage of Michael Jackson (please).