Georgian luger, Nodar Kumaritashvili

The 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada, began with a terrible tragedy. Nodar Kumaritashvili, a luger from the Georgian Olympic team, was killed during his trial run of what would have been the 21-year-old athlete’s first Olympic games. Kumaritashvili’s fatal crash was caused when he lost control in the final turn and was thrown off his luge and over the side of the track where his body hit a steel pole. Paramedics tried to revive him, but he was pronounced dead later at the Whistler Hospital.

Millions of people grieved along with the nation of Georgia and Kumaritashvili’s family. The response was sympathetic and natural to the announcement of any tragic death. News networks do not need to show a picture of a dead child for people to react with shock and grief. But the NBC news network felt the only way to get people’s attention on their coverage was to show a man’s death several times on television for the entire world to see.

In a tasteless move, NBC aired footage of the entire crash, including Kumaritashvili’s body flying into the pole and the paramedics trying to revive his bloody corpse. Forget the fact that there could have been millions of children watching this coverage, Kumaritashvili’s own family has now seen this footage. Is it fair to force the trauma of watching your son die on anyone? Absolutely not. NBC and the other networks that showed this footage sacrificed their media ethics to engage in the most obvious type of sensationalist journalism.

Of course, there are some that believe this footage should have been aired because it can act as a warning to children, that sports aren’t just games. However, just hearing that an athlete died is enough to warn me of the danger of a sport, I don’t need to see it. Even if NBC felt obligated to air the footage they could have given parents enough time to change the channel, and then refrained from showing it over and over again, in agonizing slow motion while news anchors provided commentary in the background. NBC even showed the clip right before the opening ceremonies.

They disrespected this incredible athlete, his family, and in my opinion the entire nation of Georgia. News networks refrained from showing Americans jumping from the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 because the footage was so upsetting. So why is it ok to show the death of a Georgian citizen on national news? Kumaritashvili’s father even came out and asked that the videotape no longer be shown, so as of Feb. 14, NBC President Steve Capus ordered that the footage should no longer be shown, but Kumaritashvili’s family can not unsee their son dying and that video will be online forever.

What it comes down to is that NBC could have reported this story without the video. We didn’t need a clip of Michael Jackson’s last moments in order to grasp the enormity of his death, and people did not need to see a video of Nodar Kumaritashvili being thrown from his luge in order for them to feel sad and shocked by the danger of the sport. I, personally, was grieved at the mere description of the crash and horrified when I saw the video. This is coming from a 17-year-old who has seen her share of blood on TV and in movies. I can’t begin to imagine a child’s reaction. There is a lot on TV that parents have to censor their children from, but the Olympic games should not be included. Nodar Kumaritashvili was a tremendous athlete, and he died doing the thing that he loved. His parents do not deserve having to watch their son die and he does not deserve to have his last moments on Earth broadcast in front of the entire world.