By Randy Paul of Beautiful Horizons
For those of you who do not know my blog, I write primarily about Latin America with a special interest in Brazil (more about me here). So, while Ezrinho is revisiting his raizes brasileiras, he was kind enough to ask me to fill in.
Matt Yglesias made the following comment here about Wednesday's earthquake in Peru:
I have nothing to say about it, but it seems wrong not to recognize these tragedies and their victims.
Of course it's not wrong to recognize these tragedies and their victims. What is wrong is that so much of what we hear in the news about Latin America involves these sorts of tragedies and political upheaval.
In the early 1980's I read a book that profoundly changed my view of how media in the US report the developing world back to us. The book, Coups and Earthquakes was written by Mort Rosenblum and it was a compelling analysis of media coverage in the US of the world outside the US and Europe. The title essentially reiterates the MSM focus on the developing world.
Unfortunately, precious little has changed. Google "bus plunge" and you'll see what I mean. Do the same with "coup de etat" or "strongman dictator" and you'll get the idea. How many media outlets report the fact that Brazil is leading the way in developing smaller commercial jets via Embraer and created 247 jobs in Ft. Lauderdale? How often do we hear that Companhia Vale do Rio Doce (CVRD) is the world's leading miner of iron ore? Before Hugo Chávez, how often did the MSM mention that Citgo was owned by PDVSA, the state-owned oil company of Venezuela? Much was made of the fact that in Michael Moore's film Sicko, that the US was just ahead of Slovenia in terms of health care, but I don't recall anyone mentioning that the US was just behind Costa Rica. Has anyone heard any mention that Banco Bradesco was the third bank in the world to provide online banking to its customers in 1996?
Admittedly, much of this wonkish, but it bears pointing out. I hope in my short stay here to perhaps dispel some myths about and spur some interest in Latin America.
