Saddam's execution, dramatized

Saddam's execution has not only brought violence to the streets of Iraq and criticism from some members of the international community, but it has also brought some bizarre and unexpected reactions.

One of them is the one that led a boy named Sergio Pelico, 10, to hang himself on a noose. The boy from Houston, TX, allegedly watched the TV the day before his own suicide, where the mother claims that the boy saw the images of Saddam's execution. It looks that the boy decided to experience his own recreation of the scene, but I think that the performance went too realistic.

How guilty of this strange incident are the mass media? Whilst it is true that the TV and the media's sensationalism had a lot to do in the behaviour that led this kid to hang himself, as well as the promotion and sale of toys recreating Saddam in the noose (like the figure created by the Connecticut-based Herobuilders), I would dare to say that the lack of accurate information about what was going on with Saddam by his parents (or whoever was taking care of him) had something to do. It makes me think that the communication was not the most appropriate, and... the common sense didn't play as one of his major strengths in the moment.

Sad but true.