Thursday, November 11, 2010

(Over?)Attention to Crime

Out of curiosity, I tallied the number of news stories (excluding op-ed columns) in the front section of Monday's Excélsior that were related to crime, and those that were not. The final tally: 17 were crime-related, 14 not. That strikes me as a high proportion; Excélsior is a bit more sensational than El Universal, but it's not a yellow rag. I'll check El Universal and Milenio's content if I can online, but I imagine that their proportions are not grossly dissimilar. Compounding the issue, I guarantee that the proportion of major American media stories dedicated to crime is far higher. When Mexican leaders complain about the exaggerated focus on crime, it often comes across as wanting to play deaf and dumb while infuriating a huge problem, which is infuriating. But, given that on an average day, 60 percent of a major newspaper's news stories are devoted to crime, there is something to the complaint.

Of course, I'm a (small) part of the problem, because probably close to half of my posts have something to do with crime.

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