Well said, Lynette.
"The sentence "people are starving in Ethopia" does not have as much effect as the indelible image of a hungry, globe-eyed child. To show that child's face is not sensationalism, it is reality."
I think any person who lives in Spain for some years will remember this phenomenon:
Some years ago, a well known TVE program ("Documentos TV") show a documentary about the inhuman conditions in Chinese orphanages. They told how many families in China were forced to have only one child, and when the newborn was a girl, they abandoned her. Those families didn't want a girl as unique child for social reasons. So those orphanages were full of little girls (mostly) and some boys.
The documentary show with all harshness (and a hidden camera, because filming in those orphanages was not allowed) how those poor children "lived" in a dreadful place that I can only describe as Hell. The images were truly terrible. I was a young(er) guy of those that never used to cry... but watching that indescribable documentary I dropped my tears. It was tough to see, really tough to see. You couldn't believe that was possible to treat those little children like that. I was young, I lived well and was happily unaware and I've never noticed before that the world could contain something like that. It opened my eyes.
The fact is: since they broadcasted the documentary, there began a cascade of adoption solicitation from Spanish families, who wanted to adopt Chinese girls from THOSE orphanages. They did want not only to adopt a child, but to save the little girls from those inhumane situations. Adopting a Chinese girl was then more difficult, arduous and yes, expensive, that adopting children from other countries (the adoptions from China are a bit easier today). But people had seen the Chinese orphanages with his own eyes and without softened images, and they wanted to save at least one life from that torture.
And I think: would a single phrase about Chinese orphanages have had the same effect? Of course not. People would have heared the words to forget them some time later.
So those harsh images really helped to save a number of lifes. Today, parents of Chinese girls (although those girls are growing up as Spanish so they're Spanish now) organize meetings in many Spanish cities, to share their experiences, etc.
So a harsh image DOES give MORE information than a bunch of phrases from a newsreader. We're genetically builded to answer to human suffering... but we need to SEE that suffering. A number, a statistic, a phrase, an abstract idea ...don't affects us as much as a suffering face.
You can forget a statistic, but you can't forget a suffering face so easily. So, avoiding images of what's really happening in the world (during a war, for example) is psychologically equivalent to putting your head underground like an ostrich.
If more people could see the real and true effects of a war, for example, they would change their perspective about what a war means, and about what a war makes to people: civilians, soldiers. If they could see what effects the hunger and diseases have, they would be more concerned and worried about that.
I know that TV bulletins are, sometimes, more sensationalist than the necessary about some isolated facts (i.e. suicides, common crimes, etc.). But I think that the opposite (not showing harsh images) makes you live in some kind of glass bubble. Just my opinion.