Much as we believe we are helpless against yellow journalism, the day we all refuse to pay that one dollar, everything will be cleaned up. The media are just feeding us with what we are wailing for. We, the media consumers, are the problem. "The problem of does not lie with the journalist, but with the public. I would like to argue that we can take the structure of these sentences and apply them to aspects of the media that we are so critical about, such as sensationalism, editorial bias, and they will make perfect sense. Nobody would pay one dollar to buy a series of abstract stastics reminiscent of a boring college lecture. "The problem of overcausation does not lie with the journalist, but with the public. In his book The Black Swan, Nassim Nicholas Taleb talks about how media journalists like to propose a cause for news items to make matters more concrete. Should such an unfortunate thing happen to your dear one, a website like which provides information and a registration service, should offer some hope and help. Here in Hong Kong, once in a while there are high profile news story about some girls or children suddenly evaporating. Similar stories are often heard from across the border of Hong Kong.ĭo not think that just because you happen to live in a democratic or relatively safe country, such a thing will not happen to you or someone you hold dear. In the film Slumdog Millionnaire, for example, a cold-blooded man lured the children living in the slum in Mumbai with bottles of coke, then made them blind and forced them to beg for him. While these paragraphs talk about disappearance enforced by countries, typically the totallitarian ones or ones where the rule of the law is not respected, there are also cases where people, usually helpless ones such as children or young women, are abducted or enticed. If the disappeared person was the main breadwinner for the family, they can also suffer economic hardship." They often encounter social isolation, with relatives and neighbors being too afraid to offer aid or support. The relatives of the disappeared persons suffer anguish every day, not knowing what has happened to their loved one they are victims, too. They may be tortured, detained in poor conditions and eventually killed. Disappeared persons are denied the right to a proper arrest and to a fair trial. "An enforced disappearance violates the rights of both the disappeared person and their relatives. No one is immune victims have included men, women and children. Enforced disappearances have occurred across the world - in Sri Lanka, Russia, El Salvador, Morocco, Iraq, Thailand, Pakistan, Bosnia, Equatorial Guinea, Egypt and Argentina, to name a few. Amnesty International defines an enforced disappearance as the detention of someone by the state or its agents, when the authorities deny that the victim is in custody or conceal what has happened to them. "Enforced disappearance is a grave human rights violation and a crime. You have become a victim of enforced disappearance. The officials deny having arrested you or knowing anything about your whereabouts or fate. Your relatives desperately try to find you, going from one police station or army camp to the next. They forcibly take you away, giving no reason, producing no warrant. Your captors may be in uniform or civilian clothes. You might be at home, at work or traveling on the street. "You could be taken at any time, day or night. Here is what Amnesty International USA says about "enforced disappearance": And that is what makes the International Day of the Disappeared, which took place yesterday, very meaningful. In such cases, the ones who suffer are not only the disappeared, who are under grave danger of being harmed, tortured or killed, but also their families. Except in the rather rare instances that the disappearance is self-induced, such as when the person has to flee from someone or something, most cases of disappearance involve the subjects being abducted. People don't just disappear without a reason. I believe the feelings of uncertainty, worry, agony and helplessness can be even worse than if that person is confirmed dead. Imagine that your loved one suddenly disappeared and you have not seen or heard from him or her ever since.
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