Making the world a better place
There’s no doubt newspapers can be a powerful influence for positive change. I arrived at work this morning knowing the world would be a better place thanks to The Border Watch.
Our front page story today described the messy situation of irresponsible dog owners allowing their pooches to poo on the Blue Lake walking track.
We followed up a letter to the editor denouncing the shameful spate of doggy defacations and sent a reporter to investigate.
She confirmed there are piles of doggy do every few yards, forcing walkers and joggers to duck and weave instead of enjoying the view, while cyclists and pram pushers are taking home various things they rather wouldn’t.
We quoted the opinions of various walkers. Curiously, the ones with dogs mostly declined to be interviewed. However, our photograph showed a responsible dog owner with carry bags to clean up her canine’s deposits.
Thanks to our coverage I’m confident there will be less dog poo around the lake over the next couple of weeks.
Inside the paper we carried a safety warning from the victim of a house fire.
Singed and sorrowful, she urged people not to clean their lawnmowers inside the house while smoking. That’s how she nearly came to grief.
Possibly thanks to our coverage, I’m confident there won’t be another lawnmower catch fire inside a house over the next week or so.
Flush with the spirit of being a power for good, I was brought back to reality when our journalistic big cat hunters returned empty handed.
Two reporters lurked in the forest after midnight hoping to hear or see one of the giant felines said to be prowling the nearby bush.
Their only encounter was with two armed men. Far from being perturbed, our cat seekers interviewed the men who gave their names as Fred and Fred.
They were out in the wee hours with rifles because they had read of big cat sightings in The Border Watch.
So while on the one hand we’ve educated people against doggy do and cleaning lawnmowers while smoking in the house, we’re also responsible for sending armed men into the bush.
I'm a 41-year-old father of four working as a newspaper editor at Mount Gambier in South Australia.
August 8th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
Folks here do a pretty good job of cleaning up after their dogs. Once in a while I’ll see poo on the bike path but I’ve always assumed that it’s come from a dog running off leash.
It’s been several years ago, but I recall a story about a guy warming a pot of gasoline on the stove as his fuel line had frozen and he thought hot gas would unfreeze it. It must have been an electric stove as I don’t remember the gas igniting. (Of course, if the gas didn’t ignite, how was it the event made it into the news?)