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- Read Cathy's local affairs column every Saturday in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer (see link below).
- Her national affairs column appears every Tuesday exclusively at cathysorbo.com.
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| News headlines go out on a limb. |
| Posted: Tuesday, March 6, 2007 |
It really takes a lot these days to get the full attention of the media-fed American audience. If the story isn't gory and uniquely bizarre, we don't care. We know where to go to find the types of headlines that grab and reel us in, otherwise all we need to do is give our primary news source a cursory glance to prioritize our news time.
"Suicide bomber kills 7 in Baghdad market."
"Hmm, just seven? That's not so many." I find myself thinking.
Now, if that headline were to read "Suicide bomber kills 127 at Baghdad market while holding infant in teeth" then I might spend some time with that story. Might. But just seven?
I move on.
"Rats chew off nose of baby sleeping in crib."
Eh. Probably a similar story to the one a couple of months ago about the pit bull chewing of the toes of a toddler while the parents were crashed-out on the couch.
Even the recent news of Britney Spears' attempted suicide garnered little more than glance from me.
"I could have told her way before the haircut that she was the antichrist," I thought to myself. Now, this is an emotionally unstable, psychologically disturbed young woman with two babies that I am flippantly thinking this thought about.
Cold? Indifferent? Sadly, yes.
I hate to admit it, but I have grown nonplussed by stories of war casualties, natural disaster death tolls, and reports of random shootings. I'm sure somewhere in my brain the AP photographs and news briefs are sitting there in a neat and tidy row, fermenting, waiting to give me nightmares or at the very least exacerbate my PMS.
Which leads me to comment on the growing numbers of gruesome headlines of man/woman dismemberment that have been appearing in the news.
"Farmer feeds wife to the pigs."
"Anguished wife dismembers husband's body."
"Man dismembers and cooks girlfriend before leaping to death."
Ooh, yes. Now you have my attention. These are the types of stories that pull me away from real duties like menu planning and bank balances.
The recent apprehension of a Michigan man who (allegedly) dismembered his wife ("Torso of murdered wife found in garage") makes me wonder why this couple didn't separate if they were not up to the challenge of marriage. Would it have helped if there had been something in their vows about sticking together through all adversity and never chopping the other one up into bits while the children were in the next room? Should there be a mandatory 10-day waiting period after the sale of a chainsaw or the rental of wood chippers?
As the day of my 16th wedding anniversary draws near, I think about the murderous men and women who found it necessary to kill and dismember their mates. Man, they must have been really angry. My husband and I argue and bicker too, but it would never get to the point of thinking of a good place to hide the torso.
But, this type of crime happens all over the world, the reasons being as varied as the hiding places of the body parts.
Yes, I know I am lucky to have a stable husband and on my anniversary, after I think once more about the wife and the pigs, the torso in the garage and the cooked girlfriend, I will certainly count my blessings as well as my limbs.
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