The media wrongly prioritized Titan submersible coverage over an immigrant shipwreck tragedy

The Titan submersible was the talk of the summer.

Conversations about the missing submarine fluttered around as every media outlet raced to report the latest updates. In the title of its story, WIRED called the wreck a “tragedy.” The real tragedy the media failed to report on was the ship full of over 700 immigrants that sank in the Mediterranean.

How did the media manage to, in large part, ignore this many people drowning?

In comparison with the submersible accident, this seemed just as much, if not more, of a prominent news topic.

While there were articles published on it, the vanished submarine with five rich people on board is what captured everyone’s attention. It’s incredibly important for students and aspiring journalists to recognize this and stray away from the “popular” narratives. The media play an important role in deciding for the audience what needs light shed on.

The Titan submersible was an OceanGate excursion to observe the remains of the infamous Titanic ship. OceanGate was founded in 2009 by Stockton Rush, one of the passengers on the Titan, which began its sea trials in 2018, making 10 dives in 2022. On June 18, the Titan deployed for its final journey 12,500 feet underwater.

On this submersible were four passengers who each paid $250,000 for the trip. Along with Rush, Hamish Harding, PaulHenri Nargeolet, and Shahzada and Suleman Dawood crammed into this small submersible. Not long after their departure, headlines such as “Missing Titanic sub took on extreme danger, while ‘breaking the rules’” swarmed our feeds.

The submersible lost contact about 1 hour and 45 minutes into its journey. For several days, media outlets covered every detail of the disappearance, largely ignoring other important news topics in the process.

What’s interesting is that the wreck was preventable. According to the New York Times, leaders of the submersible industry in 2018 sent a letter to OceanGate explaining their concerns, warning of “catastrophic” problems if the trips proceeded. Though more than three-dozen experts signed this letter, Rush ignored the warnings and proceeded on the calamitous journey.

On the other hand, devastating news of a boat that sank in the Mediterranean, drowning as many as 700 immigrants, was practically ignored. This fishing boat set sail with immigrants from Syria, Pakistan and Egypt, according to the New York Times. As they were on course to arrive in Italy, the boat suspiciously went down near Greece, with various allegations as to what caused the devastation.

Some survivors chalked it up to an unlucky captain. Others said there were problems with the boat’s engine. Some even claimed the Greek Coast Guard had sunk the ship by tying ropes onto the boat. Greek officials, however, said the suspected smugglers on board refused water to the immigrants, leaving them thirsty and submissive — some were already dead before the ship wrecked.

As of Aug. 17, the cause of the ship’s sinking is still under investigation.

This was a massive tragedy, with many possible causes as to what actually happened to the migrants. Though, when compared to the media coverage of the Titan, the migrant shipwreck couldn't compete. Responses to a Breeze Instagram poll supported this, with 86% of 111 respondents saying they heard about the Titan submarine “very often,” while only 12% had heard of the migrant boat.

As these events occurred nearly simultaneously, media outlets raced to cover the missing submarine, leaving the mass drowning high and dry. CNN noticed this discrepancy, questioning if the news outlets had gone overboard. Alex Shephard, a staff writer at the New Republic, said this was a sad demonstration on how the world works.

“The sinking of a boat carrying hundreds of migrants should be treated this way, but it isn’t and hasn’t been,” Shephard wrote in June. “It is undoubtedly a new story and an unspeakably tragic one—it’s also, unlike the Titanic tourists story, one that says a great deal about the way the world works.”

Journalism has always been about reporting the truth. It’s about finding the hard stories and bringing them to the people. Though, in this case, the purpose of journalism was ignored for the flashy headline.

While the implosion of the Titan was appalling and deserved coverage, the headlines that swarmed the internet were excessive in comparison to the tragedy of immigrants near Greece. Just because five people have obtained great wealth doesn’t make their lives any more valuable than the impoverished.

CONTACT Oriana Lukas at lukasok@dukes. jmu.edu. For more editorials regarding the JMU and Harrisonburg communities, follow the opinion desk on Instagram and Twitter @Breeze_Opinion.

PATRICK HANOVER contributing columnist

With the best opening-week sales of 2023, the “Barbie” movie shattered the box office. On Aug. 15, it also became the highest earning film domestically by Warner Bros. with over $537 million. Recently, women across the country have even been using it as a new barometer to see if their boyfriends are “kenough” or, more specifically, to see if they respond positively to the feminist messaging of the movie.

Indeed, like many pieces of art in the 2020s, the “Barbie” movie has been thrust into the anxietyinducing culture war — a ferocious battleground where the cultural left wing duels with the far right, wishing doom to each other to the point of rioting and homicide.

In a Breeze poll on Instagram, 89% of 141 respondents indicated they liked “Barbie.” When asked why they liked it or not, answers were often about how the movie was empowering to women and eye-opening, whereas dissatisfaction had to do with the quality of the film production itself.

Within the cultural conflict we are witnessing in 21st-century America, gender issues are at the heart of it because of the traditional gender structure being fueled by societal conformity. The right wing oftentimes wants this conformity and therefore is hostile to liberalism while the left feels like the traditional system remains in effect and change is required.

Gender nonconformity and liberation have been prominent goals for the left since the 19th century. As Friedrich Engels said in his book “Origins of the Family, Private Property, and the State” published in 1884: “The first class antagonism which appears in history coincides with the development of the antagonism between man and woman in monogamous marriage, and the first class oppression with that of the female sex by the male.” This was connecting class warfare and capitalism to patriarchy — from an intellectual in the 19th century.

To most people, the message of “Barbie” is clear: Women have been short-changed and beaten down by the patriarchy in the past. The opposite of this is matriarchy, where women are the decisive, breadwinning alphas and the men are the submissive ones, obedient in the shadows of the women. This is what was prominently featured in the movie.

In the same Breeze poll, when participants were asked if the movie expressed a feminist message, all responders said “Yes,” indicating their satisfaction with it as well.

When participants were asked if the “Barbie” movie represented the concepts of patriarchy and matriarchy well, most answers said “Yes.” Given the fact that the film industry has glorified patriarchy since its inception, it’s kind of funny to show the reverse. At the same time, this can be confusing and inaccurate considering the lack of knowledge as to what a true matriarchy would look like, as we genuinely don’t have much of an idea in the postimperial global order.

Following “stereotypical” Barbie’s encounter with “weird” Barbie, and the dynamic of the social construct in her own world as well, it became evident that the tables turning in practice isn’t necessarily the endgame for feminism.

The film industry has glorified patriarchy all the time, and the Barbie movie’s defiance of this was creative, but one should be weary of social dominance, as any sort of such is a disservice to both the oppressed and individuals within the oppressor group who don’t conform to the stereotypes of society.

Under patriarchy, men have extreme pressure to be masculine; otherwise, they are seen as defective. What really should be advocated for is freedom — not revenge — and not the reversal of the gender roles but the removal of them entirely. No one is safe in a society influenced by a structure of systematic dominance.

The fact is, in the West, and many other developed societies, patriarchy has been the predominant system of gender dominance. So, obviously, ideologically left-wing thought would take aim against patriarchy, almost exclusively as liberalism and leftism developed.

The director of “Barbie” was right on point with their excoriation of social dominance concepts. The movie suggests that “It’s Barbies dreamhouse, not Kens” and later Ken claims the opposite with his “mojo dojo casa house.” Barbie and Ken’s passive-aggressive assertions of their dominance and superiority in these scenarios appeared as a social custom for the subservient person to bow out in obedience to the ruling member they were addressing.

Picture the 1950s. Often, men asserted their dominance through various passive-aggressive statements, and women were often expected to be naively subservient to this attitude. It doesn’t take much to figure out how this could play out in the reverse, but you must think outside the box of the current world order, since even the Barbie world is bound by Western norms — the only difference is women, in traditional female fashion, are in positions of corporate power that adhere to industrial Western society. Therefore, the idea that the Barbie world would be an accurate matriarchy is based on a flawed principle.

The creators of the film probably wanted to reverse gender roles in the Barbie world to reflect what is happening in the real world. At the end of the movie, when the Barbies reclaim the Barbie world, they do recognize that men deserve rights, too, but the catch is the women will still be dominating. Isn’t that the exact same thing that happened in the 20th century? Women obtained rights, but unfortunately, the system was still operating under the same apparatus it had always been: Society still favored men, specifically gender conforming men. A way to fix this is to continue encouraging people to be themselves and not be concerned with stereotypes.

In terms of social constructs, it isn’t so easy to deprogram yourself, so you must make yourself aware through research and education. The way I see it, the revenge angle of feminism assumes all men already know about the effects of patriarchy, but the freedom angle of feminism doesn’t assume that and, instead, aims to educate men and women about themselves and different identities.

What I really liked about “Barbie” was the reference to “The Matrix” that used two shoes (red and blue pill). In “The Matrix,” Neo was awoken from a dream world, and in a way, the institutions that any society sets up can give a false sense of the truth, and it can kind of seem like a dream world.

Along with that, people don’t necessarily think about representation as a key factor in change. The movie highlights a common misconception in modern America — the idea that all injustice has been cleared up. In the scene with Will Ferrell’s character, the CEO of Mattel, he goes on a rant about how Mattel was built by women and is full of women, citing that the company has had female CEOs before.

This kind of rhetoric is similar to what’s used as an attempt to cover up the existence of systemic racism. The idea that because there are Black people who have succeeded in America, we have defeated racism entirely. Not true. The key here is that such problems are not entirely obvious. The goal of social justice is education of the masses, not revenge.

At the heart of gender dominance is anxiety of the masses. Everyone is expected to conform or feel like something is wrong with them. For every woman being patronized, being treated like a pet and put in the shadows of their male partner, there were gay people and gender nonconforming people who were denied their very right to exist in society, not to mention people with developmental challenges.

If a boy is not as strong as their peers, they might be subject to extreme torment, especially in adolescence. The left’s advocacy for gay rights among other social issues has been a great equalizer. Feminism has benefited greatly from the LGBTQ+ movement, as gender conformity is at the heart of stereotypes under patriarchy. Equality can then be achieved in the sense that men and women shouldn’t be forced to conform to any stereotypes. The traits of various groups are seen through the lens of society, and social constructs prompt these stereotypes.

The idea that we are living in a society that has subconscious influences that control the way we live without us realizing it seems like a sci-fi concept, which is what is so eye-opening because it’s reality. While we have come a long way in the grand scheme of things, advocates of social progress need to keep the stance of education and positive reform, mental health advocacy and deprogramming of stereotypes.