Because it is my role in this universe to criticize from the sidelines, I offer here my opinion about the media coverage of the Virginia Tech massacre.

Yesterday, or was it the day before, I don’t know or care, cnn.com displayed on its home page a picture of Cho with his gun at the camera. I found this extremely offensive and did not look at cnn.com for the rest of the day. That is exactly the kind of media exposure Cho wanted, and it shows the laziness of cnn’s staff. Displaying the picture is offensive because the picture presumably represents what Cho wanted his victims’ last living vision to be. Parading that picture on the front page of media is an affront to the grieving families and friends of the victims. Parading that picture on the front page of media glorifies Cho’s actions and provides an example to other sociopaths of how murder begets fame.

I’m already tired of hearing the clips from Cho’s tapes. I was tired of it after I heard him utter his first self-serving sentence. I find it extremely depressing and it reminds me of how I felt after 9/11 when I couldn’t stop watching the news, which couldn’t seem to stop replaying the same shots of the towers falling.

In the Information Age, consumers choose the information we want to consume. News media no longer needs to smack us over the head with shocking stories so that we buy their product, yet they continue to do so. Make the Cho media available, don’t censor it, and don’t beat us over the head with it. It’s not the only story to be told.

It is time for journalists to give something more when tragedies occur. The real stories, the ones with meaning, are unfolding under our noses but are far more difficult to cover than the psychotic individuals responsible for the tragedy. The real stories are in how humans come together in the wake of tragedy. The real stories are the lives that were cut short, their past achievements and their lost potential.