Did CNN, cable news get Trayvon Martin – George Zimmerman coverage right?

We try to stray away from the world of politics here on the site, and we will also attempt to do so here in terms of the judicial system. However, we are a television news site, and if you are going by what dominated television on Saturday night across the majority of cable news networks, the answer to that is pretty simple: The Trayvon Martin trial. The coverage was expansive, it was omnipresent, and it was turned into the biggest media event Florida courtrooms have seen since the days of Casey Anthony.

But was all of this coverage merited? Did the spectacle really help Martin or the newly-freed George Zimmerman’s family at all? There is a certain amount of sad irony in this story, given that “The Newsroom” premieres tomorrow and this is one of those stories that Will McAvoy would have protested covering on such a broad scale, given how tabloids often tend to get in there and start to muck it up with opinions and what are tragically what we can best refer to as courtroom fluff pieces.

Unfortunately, that is what we’ve seen for much of the past few days when it comes to CNN, Fox News, HLN or any other network out there: A recognition that these “human stories” bring in enormous ratings, and thus the focus is placed on them even when there is no need to. For those invested in the trial, Saturday’s verdict was a big one and deserved to be shown for the sake of drawing the reactions that it did, but did we need all of the extraneous coverage? Not so much, and it only causes those who spent so much time following the story to have an even more difficult time trying to move forward.

Do you think that networks handled the Martin case the correct way, by devoting so much of their individual attention to it? If you do want to read even more news related to CNN, you can do so over at the link here.

Photo: CNN