Friday, October 15, 2010

Mining for Trouble

I do not know about you, but I have been pretty enthralled with the Chilean miners' rescue efforts. In August when the 33 men were trapped I honestly did not believe this event would have a happy ending. Thankfully, I was wrong. Each man pulled from the depths was a miracle to me. What an amazing engineering story, as well as a human interest story. Personally, I am starting to wish it focused more on the engineering and drilling side and less on the human interest side. Particularly the media focus on the tangled love lives of some of the 33 miners. It started with the man who had a wife and a girlfriend waiting for him at the surface. The wife, according to the news reports, left the site before this player emerged from the ground. I know that life is complicated and things happen, but I truly struggle with not judging this man and the girlfriend harshly. I wish such reports from the media never were mentioned. The pain and perhaps embarrassment that it causes the wife and other family members must be awful. Now there are other "mistresses" of other miners coming forward to share the spotlight. Why? I am not sure. Who wants to gain 15 minutes of fame for sleeping with a married man? Right now I am about to go off on a tangent about Tiger Woods and how he brought this "dirty mistress" situation to a whole new level. However, I will not because I may just puke on my keyboard if I do.

My point is that the media is taking an event that has so many positive messages and stories of personal triumph, and making it cheap and icky. The man who had one too many ladies waiting for him, was apparently the underground pseudo-doctor when they were trapped. I am sure that each man in the mine had a function that aided in the survival of the group. Why can't that be the focus of the media and not the very human, moral shortcomings of these men that occurred above ground in their private lives? I am sick of the tawdry side of the story always being the lead on the news. Can I change this? I guess I could stop watching and reading the news, but that would just make me uninformed. Ignorance is suppose to be bliss. Right? Anyway, I still believe it is a miracle that all of these men could be saved from such a disaster. Hopefully, each will take this second chance and make a positive contribution to his community. This very strong example of getting a second chance makes me want make the most of each day. I do not need to personally be buried alive for 70 days to take away that valuable lesson.

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