Difference in Media Coverage...Are One People More Important than Another People?

So I noticed something a little strange about the two recent attacks that I posted about last week.  The first attack occurred in Brussels, Belgium, and 35 people were killed.  The second attack occurred in Lahore, Pakistan, and 72 people have died.  What I find strange is the amount of media coverage here in the United States surrounding the two attacks.  The Brussels attack, which was obviously a tragic event, was plastered all over the news for several days.  I saw post after post on social media about it.  People were changing their profile pictures to look like the Belgian flag.  Twitter was ablaze as it trended for quite a while.  On the other hand, the attack that occurred in Pakistan was much harder to get any information on.  I didn't even hear about it until almost a full day after it happened.  Aside from the article I posted, I didn't see anyone post anything on social media about it, except for one news outlet on Twitter (Reuters) that had the story.  I also verified with some colleagues that they noticed the same thing.

So what made one attack so much more newsworthy and social media trendy than the other?  Great question, which I unfortunately believe has an ugly answer.  It has to do with the location and the people.  If our media reports what is important to us, then we must, as a people, care more about what's happening in Belgium and to Belgians than we do about what's happening in Pakistan and to Pakistanis.  Even though more than twice as many people lost their lives in Pakistan on Easter Sunday than did in Belgium on March 22nd, the media coverage of the attack in Belgium easily dwarfed the coverage in Pakistan by tenfold.  Don't get me wrong here.  I am not saying that the attack in Pakistan should have had more media coverage, because both incidents were horrifyingly tragic.  And comparing them using solely the number of dead doesn't do justice to those affected.  So neither attack, in my opinion, was any more or less tragic than the other.  I just find it sad that we apparently don't care as much about one people as we do another...if the news media does indeed report on what we care about.

And please don't take this the wrong way.  I am neither trying to diminish what happened in Belgium, nor am I trying to make what happened in Pakistan sound more socially important than any similar event.  I see them as equally sad, as equally deserving of our attention and compassion, and as equally newsworthy.

So if there is a takeaway from this, I would make the suggestion to the media companies of at least my country, that we don't treat similar events differently by relegating one event to the back page, when another is front and center and in the face of everyone.  A Belgian life is just as precious as a Pakistani life.  I realize we can't have equality in everything, and I am not advocating for that.  But we shouldn't make one people more important in our perceptions than another.  We all belong to the human race and should command the same amount of respect because of it.

Please remember to Seek4Peace.