Also, May 19th to 21th (Beijing Time) have been designated by China as the "mourning period" to remember and mourn the people who fell victim to the quake.
Nationwide, all public entertainments are canceled, and the Olympic flame relay is put on hold for 3 days.
What amazes me even more, is the fact that the entire Chinese online communities are in mourning as well. All the major websites in China, including search engines, news sites, public forums, video/image hosting sites, and even P2P fileshare sites have switched to black/white mourning themes.
And literally all the MMO games hosted in China will be offline for 3 days as well in remembrance of the victims, including all games hosted by 163.com (notably cFlyff), 9th City (World of Warcraft, Ganada Espada), Lineage 2, Perfect World Online, and countless others.
It's very touching to see the more compassionate side of the Internet.
Honestly I found it pretty shocking the way the internet reacted. Normally you'd find a lot of jackasses praising the EQ, or how China deserved it. But very rarely do those pop-up, and they're flamed out of existence. Pretty unexpected to see even the most stupid of places showing respect to what happened.
To that guy looking for 'punish' the responsibles...
Here's your responsible.
Quote:
7.8-magnitude earthquake
Srsly, mind you you can't predict an earthquake. And not like there's money to build all your infrastructure prepared to resist earthquakes with this magnitude.
It infuriates me that in the biggest club football game of the year, biggest British club game ever, with millions of viewers from all over the world and masses of media coverage, a minutes silence for this event was not carried out (as far as I could see).
Thank you for your generous gift to the American Red Cross in response to the earthquake that devastated China on May 12, 2008. Your gift makes it possible for the Red Cross to provide comfort and hope to disaster victims across the affected region, helping to meet critical needs such as for shelter, food, relief supplies and other emergency assistance.
The American Red Cross works to improve the lives of vulnerable people in China and around the world. We speed relief to disaster survivors and help communities to prepare for the next emergency. We lead programs to prevent deadly diseases such as measles, malaria and HIV/AIDS. We reconnect families separated by crisis or conflict, and promote understanding of the global humanitarian principles that guide our work. Each year, the American Red Cross and our Red Cross and Red Crescent partners worldwide improve the lives of millions of people. Please continue to visit us at http://www.redcross.org/ for the most current disaster updates and information about our programs worldwide.
Your generous support means the most to the people who rely on the Red Cross to help them through some of the most difficult times of their lives. Our work can only be accomplished because of compassionate donors like you.
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05-22-2008, 08:09 PM
51,000 confirmed dead. 30,000 missing. 5 million left homeless.
I'm surprised that this received less coverage than even Myanamar (sp?) Burma. Considering the Olympics are being held there in less than 3 months, this should be a cause of concern for several nations.
I certainly don't see why a primary in Oregon or Delaware is more newsworthy than this. It just might be the sensationalism in new today. Or because China is socialist and nobody likes socialists.
This has to be right up there with the most horrible atrocities to happen among other devastating events that have happened at the beginning of the 21st century.
I was completely floored by the sheer number of lives lost in this devastating earthquake. It is really hard to see so many dead bodies being pulled out of the debris. I can't imagine the agony that the families are going through right now. It's just unbelievable.
The death toll keeps rising every morning on the news. It's things like this that really can shake ppl around the world. It happened so closely after the cyclone in Myanmar (Burma).
I've been pretty much weary of storms ever since Katrina. It seems like the storms have just gotten so violent and devastating over the past several years. I know that these types of events have happened throughout history but these recent cluster of devastating natural disasters have just brought it all from the past to the present.
And in all fairness, George Bush wasn't so great with the atrocity that happened within his own country. So I don't see why he would be doing so much for ppl outside the country. He probably does more for ppl outside the country than on the inside from what I've seen, read, and heard in news stories. Plus I see news coverage everyday about this tragedy on the main stations as well as the other news stations like CNN, FoxNews, Headline News, etc. But yes, our presidential election gets more coverage but I wish the election stuff would end. It's a political nightmare that seems to run the majority of our news; but that has pretty much been the case for just about anything except for horrible stuff that happens within our country like 9-11. And I would expect that a country would go crazy covering any horrible disasters within their own country more than anything else outside. I just wonder if China covered 9-11 or Katrina 24/7? I doubt it and wouldn't expect them too.
Well, it's not all politics on the serious news channels. NPR has done a really fabulous job of covering the earthquake. They had a couple correspondants out in that area by coincidence, planning to do a story on the city of Chengdu, a quickly-growing industrial city. They've continued with the weeks' worth of stories they were planning, with modifications of course, and done extensive reporting on the earthquake, relief efforts, and the political and social ramifications of this for China.
Typical "news" programs have been bought out by entertainment media companies, it's no surprise that horrible news, which depresses people, isn't shown. Depressing news isn't good for ratings. Find yourself a decent news source, and you'll find your stories.
My guess is that Bush has done just as much talking about China as he has most other things, it just hasn't come out in the media. Remember, we only have their word for what he's said, most news stories go through at least one editor before publication, and very few independent news orgainizations have the connections necessary to get to the press room on Pennsylvania Ave.
I agree NPR usually does a pretty thorough job of covering major world news equally. About as equal as you can get. I listen to NPR most mornings and I enjoy getting to hear some serious news stories that should be top stories on the tv news stations.
I'm sure Bush has been talking that's what politicians are good at. I just wish we could get as much action going as all the talk they do. But hey, most ppl are all talk anyways perhaps.
05-20-2008, 06:34 AM
OwL
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