Homeless Man Trapped in Dumpster Eats Own Foot

Go ahead, admit it: the headline made you read this story. If I had titled it something more earnestly rendered — such as "Homelessness Increases Due to Faltering Economy" or "People Go Hungry on America's Streets" — you might be reading something else right now. But thankfully you're here, and so am I; thus, I will ask you to read a bit further because there is a point behind the headline.

Let's call it the double-edged nature of sensationalism. This is the situation in which no one will pay much attention to a story without a dramatic tagline — yet when there is a sensational heading, that's about all people will remember. In other words, readers are drawn to the sensationalized news item, but won't get much beyond the surface of the story. Hence we have the socially-conscious writer's dilemma: present the argument in a sober in-depth manner and draw fewer readers, or sensationalize the topic to bring in many more readers who won't do much more than skim the surface.

This conundrum is particularly powerful when writing about issues of intense marginalization and potential despair such as homelessness. People who might otherwise be moved to take action or express their empathy can sometimes develop "compassion fatigue" when asked repeatedly to deal with the harsh realities of the world in which we live. A sensationalized story might break through the doldrums of mundane living and informational overload, but can it foster actual engagement or useful action?

No, says blogger Paul David Tuff, in an insightful essay on the dangers of sensationalism. "The phenomenon of sensationalism satisfies the need of Americans for any kind of excitement to medicate the reality of a soulless social system devoid of harmony and fulfillment," writes Tuff. "If we were a society of united and satisfied citizens, we would be investing our time and energy in striving to attain and maintain a global system of economic, environmental, social, cultural, religious and political cooperation."

As Tuff views it, the lack of a strong impetus toward justice reflects a profound spiritual crisis as much as a political one: "The quality of spirituality in our society is reflected instead in the hopelessness of the homeless, the militancy of our political and economic institutions, the intolerance of our religions, the rage of our criminals, the apathy of our drug addicts, and the despair many of us have of effecting social rehabilitation and cultural transformation."

He concludes that sensationalism and the inherent escapism that it fosters take us further away from tangible solutions: "To surrender to sensationalism is to relinquish whatever noble purpose we as human beings might have for our evolution. If we continue to seek escape from the horror that pervades our world, we will only ensure that the peace, happiness, and love we all desire and deserve will become increasingly difficult to preserve for ourselves and for future generations.”

Interestingly, as Tuff suggests, it is precisely the most challenging issues before us that most need our attention, and yet these are often the ones most obscured through the constant appearance of sensationalism. Oddly enough, there is an actual (fake) article with a title approximating the made-up one I used for this piece, and it demonstrates the farcical nature of "news" in the age of relentless crawls, feeds and tweets:

Tragedy befell Troy resident Paul Anderson as he was trapped in a refrigerator for three weeks, forcing him to eat his own foot to survive .... Locked in the darkness and cold, Anderson panicked. Remembering the movie Alive he ate his left foot to combat his mounting hunger. Many have noted that Anderson was surrounded by food in the refrigerator, removing the need for him to eat any of his own body parts. "Yeah, well, you don't think about that at the time. You do what you have to do to survive," said Anderson. "Besides, it wasn't half bad."

Despite such attempts at satirizing the implications of the "too much information" era, the brutal reality of a world of stratification and alienation remains. One of the most powerful reminders of this — and indeed, one that could have been sensationalized but thankfully was not in this instance — is the story of Jill May. She was first profiled by the San Francisco Chronicle in 2004 as part of a feature examining a new outreach effort to move the homeless into housing and social service programs. For May, her substance addictions proved too much to overcome; in early 2007, at age 49, her story made national headlines when she was slain by being doused with gasoline and burned alive. The local report of her death is worth considering as a cautionary tale:

Lakesha Houston and her two brothers, Ricky and Robert Smith, sat in the front row of the Lewis-Ribbs Mortuary in Bayview-Hunters Point to say goodbye to a woman they had long ago ceased to know.

They had planned the mid-March memorial service for Jill May, a 49-year-old homeless woman who was reed-thin, wrinkled, toothless and addicted to heroin and crack. She was a former prostitute who remained seduced by life on the streets of San Francisco's Tenderloin, despite the city's well-publicized efforts to help her.

None of three young adults at the service were surprised by her death, but they were devastated by its gruesome nature. On Jan. 12, two women allegedly kidnapped May off the street, took her to Candlestick Point, doused her with gasoline and burned her alive — a slaying that made national news for its utter depravity.

To San Francisco residents, homeless people like May — in tattered clothes, sleeping on cardboard — are a common sight around the city. But to Lakesha, Ricky and Robert, this woman was not a tragic icon of homelessness, or a sensational news story.

She was Mom.

Please, the next time you see a sensationalized headline, try to get past it and connect with the human beings and their stories behind the glitz. When the news seems overwhelming in its breadth and scope, seek to quiet the din by taking one small item of interest and exploring it in-depth. Most importantly, I urge us all not to confuse style with substance, and not to let the incessant infantilizing of the news cycle prevent us from meaningful engagement with the pervasive challenges in our midst.

Photo credit: BlatantNews.com