It was pointed out in a BBC interview yesterday lunchtime that the fact that the women seemingly most at risk are prostitutes makes it hard for the police to get in contact with them other than through the media, the dubious legality of prostitution making the women avoid the police.
Although at the same time it should also be pointed out the interview was slating the law regarding prostitution for this reason, women having to work in unsafe areas to avoid the police.
Police have now found two additional female bodies in woodland near Ipswich…
That’s five bodies now, and it sounds like they are linked.
Absent from this comparison are the prurient or moralising tones that some of the reporting has included.
Oh, for goodness sake. I don’t see anything about ‘illusions’ in that quote, and you’re misrepresenting why I gave it in the first place.
Neither is good safety information, if it’s coming from the pen of a journalist. The role of the media is not that of giving public safety advice. That’s what the police have been doing over the past few days. They’re the ones in the position to provide it.
The detective leading the case has even given out her own personal mobile number to try to break down this barrier.
Even if we are to assume that there were “prurient” or “moralising” terms used (and I would only grant the latter, and then in limited instances), so? Should the papers have refrained from reporting the salient details because of the ‘moral’ connotation? Even if they were engaging in sensationalism and NY Post style lurid headlines… so?
No, no illusions there.
Wrong. And weird… since I can quote you.
Like this.
Safety information isn’t safety information if a journalist writes it? By what strange alchemy, exactly?
And if for some reason you believe that telling a specific class of people who are being targeted for murder that they’re being targeted is, for some reason, not “safety” based information…
Naw, if the media has information that could save lives, they should totally keep it under their hats.
And how, exactly, do you think that police spread this message? Shouting to random people on street corners?
Pretty much to be expected, unfortunately.
[QUOTE=GorillaMaThe role of the media is not that of giving public safety advice.
[/QUOTE]
Well, I’m not sure I would agree with that. I do think one of the legitimate roles of media would be providing information that leads to greater safety. But, at any rate, even if you’re a complete purist in the role of the media, it’s there to disseminate information and the fact that these young women killed were all prostitutes is more certainly newsworthy information. I’d expect an editor to be severely reprimanded or fired if they did not report such an important detail. Hmm, three women dead, all three are prostitutes…hmmm… Is there a connection? Maybe it’s a stunning coincidence, who knows, but the public and sex workers have a right to be informed of the facts.
Obviously, the three girls (or whatever number we’re at now) being prostitutes adds to the fascination of the story, brings back Jack-the-Ripper references, and helps sell papers. So what? That does not mean it’s not a newsworthy and legitimate detail to report.
Some of the reporting, at least in the early stages, was certainly prurient. Admittedly, now the full scale of what’s going on is emerging (rather than the missing-person story it started out as), it’s become a lot more level-headed.
They should refrain from exploiting particular salient details specifically to push particular moral buttons in their audience.
Not knowing everything about a 25-year-old’s life != illusion.
Or I can quote another part of that article: “Brian and Gail Adams released pictures from their family album to show that their daughter Gemma led a life that was not adequately described by the term prostitute.”
Sounds to me like their problem was with the media’s presentation of the story.
A journalist isn’t privy to as much information about the situation as the police, and so is less likely to be able to give appropriate safety information. And if it’s combined with sensationalism, then no, it’s not good safety information.
Nope. Actually, our local news has been doing the responsible thing, passing on the message untouched, through unedited broadcasts of interviews and press conferences with senior police.
So I’ll ask again…how many prostitutes need to be killed for you to think it’s ok for the media to say, “Prostitutes are being killed”? I get a DUI once, the news stories are going to call me a drunken driver even if it’s the first time it happened. And even if it doesn’t “adequately describe” my life. And rightly so.
So you like your news to be a mouthpiece for police? May I suggest you buy a scanner and let reporters actually, you know, report? The job of the media is not to take dictation from a microphone.
five’s a pretty good number IMO.
Two more bodies found.
BBC NEWS | England | Suffolk | Forensic teams scour murder scene
What a fucking stupid argument. Here’s an example of the right way to do it from CTV:
“British detectives believe they are dealing with a serial killer after the bodies of five women, three confirmed as prostitutes, have been found.”
That’s not so fucking hard, is it? Nobody’s saying don’t mention that prostitutes are being targeted. Those posters insisting that identifying the dead people primarily by their profession is entirely in the interest of accuracy and helpfulness to other hookers are lying. They’re just lying. They know damn well what it’s about, and that it’s possible to convey the same information without prurient overtones.
I really don’t see much difference between this lede and the one in the story linked to in the OP, other than the order in which prostitute and woman are used. And I do feel that the OP, at least, seems to think that’s it’s not appropriate to reveal this information at all.
Not really sure how the order of words can be discounted when examining the implications of a sentence.
It’s possible. I only see a couple of posts from him, and they don’t make it clear.
The gist I took to be:
But then he does mention the whole dead Irish politician thing as if this should be covered up to the same degree. So you may be right. Hopefully, he’ll return and explain. GorillaMan, anyway, is definitely not advocating a total ban on mentioning the fact, as Garfield keeps trying to imply.
Where have I said this shouldn’t be reported? It’s the lurid delight which headlines writers took in mentioning ‘prostitutes’ and ‘vice girls’ at every opportunity (and more) which I objected to.
Nice analogy - if your intention is to blur the distinction between victim and culprit.
No. This is an exceptional situation, and part of the response from a responsible media outlet is to aid in diseminating public statements from the police.
The link in the OP is to a page which has been rewritten (note the ‘update’ time on that page postdates the OP)
Their prurient occupation is what is putting them in harm’s way. I won’t pretend there’s no prurient element involved in the reportage, but it is equally if not more important IMO…both for the safety of the prostitutes themselves and in terms of potential witness-spotting of suspicious activity and/or people…to publicize the fact that this murderer is targeting prostitutes.
It’s terrible when innocent family members get hurt, but the greater importance is rightfully placed on alerting other prostitutes of the danger and in alerting the public in general to be on the lookout for suspicious activity.
Further, even if you’re cynical enough to think the police don’t really care about the murder of prostitutes and their alleged concern is specious, they still don’t want to have to contend with more murders and the publicity that attends them.
So yes, I think the police and the media have legitimate reasons of greater weight than pruriency to publicize the fact that these women were prostitutes, despite your characterization of this viewpoint as a lie.
Great idea - contradict the latest advice we’re being given by the police, which is for no women to go out alone at night.
Taxi for Mr Strawman
Whooooah…when did these two get conflated? We are still talking about unpleasant media sensationalism, aren’t we?
Absolutely.
Starving Artist, either you’re not reading, or still lying. The post you respond to was extremely clear, as subsequent ones have been, that we don’t think the fact that they are prostitues should be left out of the stories.
I have to say to the people who are really bothered by the coverage that you should strap yourselves in.
It seems certain now that there’s a serial killer on a spree. The press will be in frenzy mode now that there have been five deaths in such a short time. They’ll give him a name very shortly it will just get worse from there. If he isn’t caught soon you’ll have lots of stories about the girls and their job.
If/when they catch the fuck the stories will focus on him though. Look for the “I spent a steamy night with the RIPPER” stories in The Sun
This is just starting and a large section of the British press have very large cocaine fuelled erections tonight 
Oh, puh-leese! You know as well as I do that there will still be plenty of girls and johns out there. Food, drugs, rent (and pimps, presumably) still need to be financed, etc.
You hailed it, you pay the fare.
Sorry, I was of the impression that we were all adults here. Surely you’re aware of the synergy that often exists between the media and the police at times like these. If you think the police don’t want, expect and encourage the media to report these details, you are naive indeed.
I was responding to the fact that you allege anyone who isn’t in agreement with you is lying.
I don’t see how the dancing on the head of a pin that you propose would make anyone feel any better about how their family member or loved one came to meet their end. Further, what happens when the other two victims are confirmed as prostitutes? Another announcement is made that two more victims have been confirmed as prostitutes. “Ah-ha!”, everyone says. “I thought so!”
So everyone is still focused on the fact that these women are prostitutes, everyone still knows that they are prostitutes, and whatever pruriency is to be derived from this knowledge is still out there but with the additional aspect of curiosity over whether the newest victims were prostitutes as well.
So, given that this approach will ultimately serve only to focus even more attention upon prostitution as a key aspect of the killings, how is it exactly that this is supposed to downplay the fact that they were prostitutes?
And how is it that anyone disagreeing with you is “lying”, rather than simply of a different opinion?
No. I allege that anyone who claims that the media plays up the hooker angle as a public service is lying, and knows perfectly well that is not the only reason. As was very clear in my first post, so here you go with the lies some more.
Let’s take another look at the “dancing on the head of a pin” you say I propose, taken from a CTV article:
Yes, clearly that is an insane amount of dancing around the truth. How totally excessive and bleeding-heart of me to propose that as a good standard for handling the story. It’s a good thing you’re here to instruct fools like me on the sheer recklessness and disregard for the facts displayed by the above.
I don’t know, you tell me – you’re the only one asserting that. Certainly a person would have to be incredibly stupid to get that impression from what I said, so if you could include your sources, that’d be nice, too.