As a member of the media, look to soap operas if you want the Ben & Jerry approach to what's trendy to highlight at the moment.

Contrary to opinion, most journos are not blood-thirsty, hard-hitting, don't-give-a-damn members of society ready to exploit human suffering, nor do we have horns at the top of our head. We report on what is of interest to people at that moment, of course - I don't think NY would've liked it if we'd ignored the aftermath of 11 September. But think about Live Aid - that came about because Bob Geldof was so outraged by a BBC News report about the famine in Africa that no-one had bothered about before until the journalist/BBC thought "That needs telling" and went out and did it. What about John Pilger reporting on the Killing Fields of Cambodia? Were they jumping on bandwagons? And even if they were, didn't some good come out of it at the end?

Our job is to tell people what is going on in the world, and I'm afraid attacks by ETA, IRA, al-Qaida, whatever, are part of that. I would love to report on kittens and newborn babies and fluff like that, but then would that stop you being aware of all the SOBs in the world who could hurt your children? If we don't tell what evil terrorist groups are doing, then that makes it all the more easier for their propaganda machines to kick in. After all, one of the first things Hitler did was take over the national press so only pro-Nazi stories were put out.

Believe it or not, we do educate the world. There are, of course, scuzzy newspapers who do thrive on reporting the worst. But that is not the majority. Don't lump "the media" as one big evil for merely reporting aspects of the world you may not wish to hear about.