The Parable of the Reporter, the Producer and the Camera Person

One day while teaching, Josh was asked, ”Teacher, when cable news becomes the news what’s new about the news?”

Josh spoke thus:

A reporter was watching nothing unfold.

“There is nothing to see,” the reporter said to the camera person.  Indeed, there was nothing to see.  This was the third hour in which there was nothing to see.

Three hours ago something that might have been expected not to have happened hadn’t happened.  Whatever hadn’t happened might have been expected not to have happened.  It would not have been a surprise for what had not happened not to have happened.  So when what would have been expected not to have happened hadn’t happened, no one had been surprised.

There had been a lack of reports of nothing happening all over the city.  In the northern neighborhoods, once affluent, then middle class, then poverty stricken, now gentrified, many things that might have been expected not to have happened did not happen.  As would have been expected, there had been no need for confirmation by the authorities that the northern neighborhoods were devoid of happenings that might have matched the description of what might have been expected to have happened had what hadn’t been expected to have happened been expected to have happened.

To the east, where what might have been expected to have happened might have more probable, there was no sign of what might have happened happening.  To the west, another zone open to a lack of occurrences of what hadn’t occurred, what might have been expected to have happened, had it happened, would have happened without being recognized as having happened.

The southern part of town, then, was where the reporter, producer and camera person had pinned their hopes.  And like a herd to a lead bell, other reporters had congregated, drawn by the possibility of a happening.  

The police had been called in to cordon off the area designated as that area where an event might have been expected were an event expected.  Blue and red and yellow lights circulated atop emergency vehicles, police cars and city service vans.  Were something to have happened, emergency response, law enforcement and the city would have been prepared.

The citizens of the southern quadrant were in lock down.  The national guard was on alert.  Snow plows were readied.  The snow plows weren’t expected to be needed, but the snow plow drivers’ union was sharp and knew an overtime opportunity when they saw it.

It had been a mystery what had triggered the mass search for what was happening.  It had been a little event, a seemingly meaningless, prima facia random event, a quotidian, routine action.  But the reporter’s news team was a crack news team and the reporter’s news team had tools at its disposal.  Now the reporter’s news team had utilized those tools, and the reporter’s news team’s producer was being notified of the scoop.  Only the reporter’s news team’s producer knew the origin of the lockdown, the origin of the vigil, the origin of the search.  

What had happened to spark the search for what was being searched for?

“It was us,” the producer said to the reporter, “Our dispatcher heard you had gone out, and our dispatcher had alerted our crews that the media was on the move.”

“On the move?” the reporter said, “We were going out for Chinese for lunch!”

The reporter, the producer and the camera person stood silent for a minute.

“Do you think anyone would notice if we just snuck out?” the reporter asked the producer.

“Let’s go,” the camera person said.  The reporter and the camera person began clandestinely to pack their equipment into their van.

The producer dialed the home office, “Home Office, we’re about to...”

“Shhhhh!” the reporter interrupted.