Monday 28 May 2007

Let's leap on to the bandwagon

I can't help wondering about this whole Madeleine McCann awfulness. Yes, obviously it is mind-blowing that someone could abduct a child, and I (obviously) hope that she will be found safely.

But the coverage? The coverage! A minute's silence? The imminent re-release of Don't You Forget About Me? The statement from Prince Charles and his wife lending their support?! The pledge by Gordon Bandwagon Brown that he'll do what he can?

It's beyond belief that we all care so much while we and our allies blow people up in friendly fire in Iraq, and cause 'collateral damage' that creates orphans and maims them. We haven't had a minute's silence for all the children who have been shot and killed in this country, or for those who have been abused and had their lives irrevocably damaged.

It was Missing Children's Day in the UK on Friday – 70,000 children go missing in this country each year. What is the criteria for gaining the support of Charles, Camilla and Gordon Brown? I bet the parents of the 70,000 wouldn't mind knowing.

4 comments:

  1. Agree with this. It's so sad for the child but how long can they go on with this story?

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  2. Obviously the parents want to keep their daughter in the public eye. It's the Diana-like proportions that this is taking on (and the number of 'celebrities' who are finding ways to be mentioned in newspaper copy) that I find disturbing.

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  3. Hey Mellifluous Dark - agreed. I have found the coverage both disgusting and entirely warped. It makes me cringe when I see these completely OTT reactions from our woefully lachrymose press.

    An absolutely awful thing to have happened, no dispute, and I feel a natural sympathy towards the parents for enduring such a harrowing and traumatising experience - perhaps the very worst for any parent to suffer - but I simply despair at the extent of the press coverage about Madeleine McCann, to the (obvious and natural) exclusion of other news.

    I don't blame the parents for trying to generate publicity, but I do blame the press for fixating on this story. Distasteful in the extreme when one considers for the merest moment the suffering and catastrophic hardship we singularly fail to care about when it happens to "others" who may be less middle-class, less articulate, less photo-friendly and most certainly less white.

    It makes me feel rather sick.

    Kind regards etc.......

    TPE

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  4. Warped is exactly right, TPE.

    You said exactly what I was thinking in your last paragraph. There's no doubt that pictures of the pretty, sweet white girl and her good-looking, weeping parents make damn 'fine' copy.

    Someone said (on a radio programme a few days ago) that there would be no such prolonged coverage if Madeleine was a black or brown – or an obese/ugly – child from a dodgy estate brought up by relatively deprived parents. It didn't really need saying. I hate the fact that it's true.

    It turns my stomach, too.

    Best wishes to you...

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