Bell Globemedia goes overboard

This page is saddened by the disappearance of Laura Gainey, a 25 year old woman who fell off a tall ship near the Cook Islands last week. What's really sad, however, is the saturation coverage this story has received in the pages of the Globe and Mail, delivered in a manipulative, demographically-driven context that brings little comfort to anyone except Bell Globemedia shareholders. In reading the articles concerning Ms. Gainey's disappearance, the only real information this page could glean about her was that she 25 years old and she liked to sail, give or take some factoids about tall ships and the challenge of sailing of them in rough waters to this day.

Most of what I read, however, centered around Laura Gainey's father, Bob Gainey. Bob Gainey was an all-star left winger for the Montreal Canadiens during the 1970's and currently serves as the club's General Manager. Of course, if you're a baby boomer and a hockey fan, you already know that. You should also know that thanks to this country's sorry lack of regulation concerning concentration of media ownership, Bell is using your sentiment about this accident to further the corporations CTV and TSN properties.

This is the really sad part: Laura Gainey's disappearance is only newsworthy because of her familial association with the National Hockey League. Bell Globemedia is in a bidding war with the CBC for national television rights to the National Hockey League, and is eager to supplant the longtime home of Hockey Night in Canada. In the next few days, the Globe's op-ed pages (and the intermission show during the NHL on TSN broadcast) will wax sophomoric about how Gainey's loss is a shared tragedy, and how much hockey and the people who play it equate to royalty in Canada. In turn, Bell Globemedia's negotiators will be able to show Gary Bettman and the NHL Board of Governors how deeply it cares about the game and the people around it.

Too bad none of the women who disappeared in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside over the past couple of years weren't related to any NHL personalities. Maybe someone would have noticed their disappearance sooner....