In Praise of Chicken Little

I would like to give a special shout-out to a much maligned group of individuals who get very little appreciation or, at times, respect: the Chicken Littles of world. No, I am not talking about the nut jobs who are convinced there are aliens hiding behind every mailbox in every city in America. Nor do I mean the fanatics who are certain that every time President Obama swears death panels are not part of his new health care proposals, what he is actually doing is sending a secret message that death panels really are part of his health care proposals. Sadly, there are some people, I am convinced, with whom one cannot reason. Rather, I am referring to those who are reasonable, knowledgeable and sincerely care about helping the rest of us deal with real world problems. They want us to know what to do in case there is a fire in our building or if we have been diagnosed with the H1N1 virus or if our community is hit with a natural disaster.

When times are calm, we may jokingly call these people Chicken Little, but if any of us do, then it is my hope we do so with affection and respect. These individuals are important members of our communities and should be valued for what they do. One of the biggest challenges these professionals face falls under the heading of risk communication. It is this form of communication that is a continuous process in which the communicator attempts to share important information with various publics that they can use in case a potential threat comes to pass. Think about the challenge these communicators face. For most of us, when the sun shining the last thing we want to hear is how we should keep an umbrella close at-hand in case it rains. Yet the risk communicator is the person who needs to figure out a way to get us to not only keep an umbrella nearby just in case but also to know what to do with it should we get hit with a cloud burst.

The risk communicator works to help us prepare for potentially dangerous situations that we cannot see but on some abstract level recognize could potentially become real. In the past eight years our country has been "hit" in a number of significant ways that have been both devastating and unnerving. The terrorists attacks of 9/11 are an obvious example. An anthrax scare, which came right on the heels of that, are another. And then there was Huricane Katrina. How well prepared were we as a society for those times? How well prepared are we now? Under the guidance of competent leaders, it is often the risk communicator who helps improve our state of national and personal readiness. As the eighth anniversary of the attacks of 9/11 passes, it is good for us to recognize the efforts of the risk communicator. At times, via their research and various informational campaigns, they may come across as Chicken Littles. But more importantly, they also have our welfare at heart.