BEFORE ANYONE READS THIS, KNOW THAT I’M BASING ANY MEDICAL DISCUSSION ON WHAT I PERSONALLY KNOW AND THAT I’M A POOR COLLEGE STUDENT MAJORING IN COMMUNICATIONS WITH ABSOLUTELY NO MEDICAL BACKGROUND WHATSOEVER. FEEL FREE TO CORRECT ME IF I’M WRONG ABOUT ANYTHING.
It seems like the only thing that makes headlines more often than the Kardashians is who’s angry with Wal-Mart or what Wal-Mart did this time. I had a little bit of background information regarding Wal-Mart’s little PR game, because the actual Wal-Marting started in Las Vegas, I think? I live in Phoenix, and it’s both surprising and impressive how fast word gets around that things are happening at the local Wal-Mart.
But here’s what caught my attention the most. The part in the article we read that stated “One entry told about a worker whose company insurance paid for costly surgery and a pacemaker for his son” (Wal-Mart Public Relations in the Blogosphere). Hmm, thought I, what kind of condition could this person have? I was working on a short story involving a character with a heart condition (which, as is somewhat common knowledge, is what pacemakers are generally used for). So I decided to do a little bit more digging. I found an article on BusinessWeek that went a little more in-depth. “One of them [the worker testimonies] from the shop at Amarillo, Tex.,” it began by saying, “reads: Cragg Thompson joined the Wal-Mart team six years ago…Cragg’s son, Brandon, contracted cardiomyopathy—a serious disease in which the heart muscle becomes inflamed and does not work as well as it should because of a viral infection…” (Gogoi 2006) yadda-yadda-yadda.
*cue screeching tires sound effects and my head exploding from sheer frustration*
Let me start off by clearing something up. “Cardiomyopathy” is a term that can be used to refer to pretty much anything wrong with the heart. But usually, people use it to refer to anything that leads to heart failure.
Next: To ‘contract’ something means to ‘catch’ something, to ‘become infected with’, and any journalist worth their salt knows it is a term not used to refer to things like heart failure. That’s not to say it can't be used for this, it just usually isn’t. It’s more often used to refer to things like pneumonia or tuberculosis, pick your poison, I don’t care.
But word choice is a petty grievance.
The thing that caught my attention the most was the claim that this guy contracted cardiomyopathy from a viral infection. Now, certain infections are indeed listed as a trigger of cardiomyopathy. But do note the use of the word ‘trigger’. This is because these certain viral infections cause a condition called myocarditis, “an inflammation of the myocardium; the middle layer of the heart wall. Myocarditis is usually caused by a viral infection” (Mayo Clinic). Now, myocarditis is a common cause of dilated cardiomyopathy and it does go by the name of inflammatory cardiomyopathy.
TL; DR: ‘Brandon’ didn’t ‘contract’ cardiomyopathy. He ‘contracted’ myocarditis which led to a case of--probably dilated—cardiomyopathy. But you know, I'm sure saying he has a big scary word like ‘cardiomyopathy’--which with a word like 'cardio' in it means most everyone will recognize it as being related to the heart--probably makes Wal-Mart look a lot better.
Was this seriously a post about me being a stickler for details? Oh, hell yeah it was.
But let's bring this back to the ethics side of things, shall we? Technically, Wal-Mart didn't do anything unethical by having these posts and starting this blog, or at least I don't think so. Anyone can have a blog to make them feel better about themselves, I think. I know I'm way cooler online than I am in real life. To me, that's not illegal or unethical. But what I think was unethical of them was trying to force a positive spin on worker conditions, which--as we all may or may not know--isn't exactly something Wal-Mart gets praised for. It basically created an image that didn't have both sides of the story, just a bunch of happy workers who's lives were saved or improved by Wal-Mart. What I think was unethical was that they took away the voices of the actual workers to provide happy-end stories instead.
No comments:
Post a Comment