The Star is "SHOCKED"--but for the wrong reason, it seems

Once in a while, these things almost write themselves. This is one of those.

The front page of The Kansas City Star has a big headline today: "SHOCKING INCREASE IN DEATHS".

So I'm thinking, great, they're finally covering the senseless murders city-wide.

Wrong.

It's an article about a big upswing, they say, in deaths by drunk drivers.

WTF?

Are you kidding me?

It seems there are a whopping 36 deaths this year, so far, in people being killed by drunk drivers. And sure, that's terrible and a tragedy. Heck, I've been nearly killed twice by drunken drivers so it's not as though I don't sympathize.

But they're "SHOCKED" about 36 deaths by drunken drivers.

I don't believe they've yet expressed any of that same shock over the 98 senseless, ugly, vicious murders by weapons here in the city.

And sure, it's not as big an increase in deaths by weapons but it is an increase.

It would seem that people shooting people would be a worse, and more senseless, tragic issue about which to be shocked.

Then, I went further into the article, back on page A10 and suddenly you realize a disparity.

Check out all the pictures of the people killed by these drunk driving tragedies.

See a pattern?

Yeah. I thought so.

They're all white.

So The Star is "SHOCKED" a big upswing in deaths by drunk drivers amounting to 36 but they're not upset about an upswing (admittedly smaller but an upswing) of 98 murders by weapons.

I would love to know what the statistics are of the percentage of people who have been murdered this year in Kansas City and what percentage of them were White, African-American and Hispanic. I think it could be illuminating.

I'm certainly not saying The Star shouldn't have reported on this increase in deaths by drunk drivers, not at all. I'm just saying that the much bigger story is the nearly 100 deaths by weapons.

If The Star would get together with the police and the East side of town--the whole community of churches and associations and groups of people who want to fight the deaths by guns and gun violence--they could write a series of articles about the problems and a) possibly solve the problems and b) increase readership.

It's a thought.

For clarification, I have to say, I don't take the newspaper any longer and I may have missed a big, recent article covering these shootings and killings but I don't think I have. There was one--last Spring?--on the murders in one area code (64012?) in Kansas City but that's been it since, I believe.

This just seemed like an odd, possibly unfair and obvious discrepancy in reporting for the paper.

I know people will let me know if I'm wrong--or if they think I am.

Link: http://www.kansascity.com/637/story/1570597.html