Just why is this "inspirational"?

She tells her story: She is helping out her parents by staying home with a sick sibling, a brother who is much younger than she. Shortly after their parents leave for work, the home is bombed. The blast burns the girl, rips flesh from her body, exposes bone.

Her brother appears to be in much better shape and, astonishingly for such a young boy, manages to get her to a hospital. Then it is discovered that her brother actually has sustained a mortal injury. He is dying. Nothing can be done.

Despite her own injuries, the girl tries to comfort the boy. She watches her brother die. She survives, but will have a lifetime of physical and emotional suffering.

CNN calls this an inspirational story.* Why is this story considered inspirational instead of horrifying, heart-breaking, terrifying, horrific? Because the brother and sister were victims of the Hiroshima bombing. In the minds (and style guides) of American cable news writers and producers, that makes "inspirational" the only available word choice. It's bad form to use the words horrifying, heart-breaking, terrifying, and horrific to describe the effects of US bombing on civilians.

The CNN story gives us a happy ending of sorts (can't leave the viewers bummed out about nuking kids). Despite her injuries and repeated bouts with cancer (the result of radiation poisoning), the young girl eventually gives birth to a son, and the son -- like the uncle he'll never know because he was "lost in Hiroshima" -- loves music. In fact, he grows up to become a symphony conductor.


Just imagine that it's 60 years in the future. Will we be hearing an "inspirational" story about this little Iraqi girl, whose parents were tragically and mistakenly gunned downed by American troops? Not if she's militant. Not if she hates Americans. Not if she winds up institutionalized, damaged forever by the psychic trauma.

Ah, but if she grows up to become, say, the prime minister of Iraq, or a researcher who develops a process for regenerating lost limbs, or, better yet, a scientist who develops an endlessly renewable fuel for American SUVs -- or even if she has a child who achieves any of these, then yes, her survivor's tale will be classified "inspirational." And Larry King IV will do the interview.


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*"Inspirational" is generally defined as "imparting a divine influence on the mind and soul" [source].