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Thursday, September 20, 2001
As the reports began to come in last Tuesday morning of planes smashing into buildings, America developed an instant and ravenous hunger for information. Trying to feed it as quickly as possible, the media rushed bulletins onto the airwaves.
The Allegheny County Department of Emergency Service has activated a Disaster/Rumor Control Hotline staffed by volunteers from CONTACT Pittsburgh. The hot-line number is 412-820-4300.
Not every report turned out to be true. And that continued through the week, with bogus reports of rescues of survivors we only wished were real.
This is an era of instant communication, and in times of crisis, it can be tempting to pass on information without checking it. That temptation is increased when the message is one Americans are hoping to hear.
E-mails beeped onto screens bearing a supposedly timely pro-U.S. speech from a Canadian commentator that was nearly 30 years old and an eerie Nostradamus verse that was entirely bogus.
Meanwhile, Americans took to talk radio to cry for vengeance. Two local hosts gave them a target. An e-mail saying that Middle Eastern doctors in McKeesport had celebrated the terrorist attacks on the United States became instant "news" when its contents were discussed on the air. The FBI investigated the accusation and found it entirely false -- fortunately, before anyone had harmed the doctors.
Talk radio has never been a reliable source of information; mostly, it's a forum for callers to vent about their ideological pet peeves, be they cloning, global warming or Rep. Gary Condit.
KDKA General Manager Michael Young defended talk radio as "a good outlet. It gives people the opportunity to talk about things." Indeed, talking things out can be therapeutic, but spreading unsubstantiated accusations is at best foolish, at worst dangerous. FBI spokesman Jeff Killeen said the McKeesport rumormongers were "simply not thinking."
When information may prove damaging to someone, it's wise to consider the source.
