Media power, media responsibility

The suicide of Raoul Moat was, among other things, a media event.

Inevitably so, perhaps. But what kind of event? And did we - the news media - get it right?

Writing in the Observer, Barbara Ellen, amidst a dissertation on "the almost-nuclear frustration of the failed male", asks one sensible question:

"Is this where we are now as human beings, in Britain, in the year 2010?

Homicidal sprees as another form of spectator sport?

Just another button on the remote control, perhaps labelled 'Homi-tainment', with a helpful skull and crossbones motif?"

Later, Moat's brother, Angus, said of his sibling:

"He was a mentally ill man under a lot of stress who cracked, and it was just the final straw.

His actions, although I appreciate were absolutely horrendous, and although I wish he hadn't gone ahead and done what he did, were a cry of anguish.

It was a cry of pain. The media have been bigging him up as a kind of Rambo-type character. It's crazy."

Let's talk about the role of the media. Here - or on Twitter at #cojodisco.