The Power to Decide What is "News"

So, by now everyone with functioning retinas has seen the news that John Edwards has admitted to having an extramarital affair in 2006 -- an affair that may or may not have resulted in him fathering a daughter out of wedlock. (Hmm...perhaps Senator Edwards would like to rework his "Two Americas" trope? How about, "One America that cheats on its incurable-cancer-ridden spouse and one that does not"?)

Despite the frenzied media coverage of this story over the weekend, rumors of an alleged affair have dogged Edwards for years -- particularly on the blogosphere -- leaving some to wonder why the mainstream news media didn't pick up the story sooner.

Some theories: (1) the media kept quiet out of respect for Elizabeth Edwards, whose public battle with incurable breast cancer garnered her considerable public sympathy; (2) there was insufficient credible evidence of an affair to move the story beyond speculation, at least until Edwards' admission of guilt; and (3) the story was originally reported by The National Enquirer, and "respectable" media outlets didn't want to follow the trail of a supermarket tabloid.

Conventional wisdom says that it was #2; in fact, ABC News sources say that they were close to gathering enough verifiable evidence of an affair that they likely would have aired the story this week anyway, even without Edwards' confession:

Asked by CNN's Howard Kurtz if sympathy for Elizabeth Edwards played any part in an apparent reluctance to report the story, ABC correspondent Kate Snow said no.

"We at ABC were working on this story, and if we had had any proof and any verifiable facts, we certainly would have gone with the story," she said. "It was just a matter of, we're not going to put something on the air until we know that it's true."

On this particular story, most major news networks took the stance that the rumors of an affair were not newsworthy.

Brian Ross, ABC's chief investigative correspondent, said his investigative team was pushing hard following the money trail, looking at such things as who paid for [Edwards' mistress's] fancy California home and the use of campaign funds.

He said that even without Edwards' admission, ABC probably would have been able to run a story about the issue this week.

Still, there was some acknowledgment that #3 was an issue, too:

David Carr, a columnist for The New York Times, said many news organizations "tend to pick up stories from the National Enquirer with tongs."

What I found most interesting about this article -- and what made me think about previous discussions we've had concerning the role of technology in reporting/recording crimes -- was the comment from NYT columnist David Carr about who has the power to decide what is "news":

"I was taught when I was a young reporter that it's news when we say it is. I think that's still true -- it's news when 'we' say it is. It's just who 'we' is has changed," Carr said.

"Members of the public, people with modems, people with cell phones are now producers, editors. They can push and push and push on a story until it ends up being acknowledged by everyone."

Isn't that the truth? And the power of technology to raise awareness of events -- including crimes -- goes well beyond posting cell-phone videos on YouTube. For example, the grassroots movement to investigate the rape and murder of Private LaVena Johnson has gathered tremendous momentum recently, and has occurred largely online.*

It seems like a topsy-turvy world when The Enquirer is blazing journalistic trails ahead of ABC News and the New York Times, but opportunities for lay people to agitate for media coverage of an event seems to grow exponentially as technology becomes both more accessible and more sophisticated. Now if only someone could get a decent camera-phone video of the elusive "Bat Boy".

*P.S. Stay tuned for what I hope will be our first guest blogger post about disparate media coverage of murdered white women and women of color.

McGruff the Crime Dog!

First off, I must say that I *love* McGruff the Crime Dog. I would imagine that every criminal justice or criminology professional feels the same way. As a few of you know, I was so excited to be a part of this Cyberbullying Press Event at the National Press Club because a) it's a huge honor and b) I knew that McGruff would be there and I really wanted to get a picture with him. That would have been such a wonderful way to mark the trip. After the Event was over, I saw McGruff taking pictures with many other attendees, and figured he would hang out a little so I would have my chance. Meanwhile, people came up and asked questions about my work (much like any conference setting), and so I was momentarily distracted from my goal of getting a picture with the iconic legend that is the Crime Dog. After I had talked to everyone who was waiting for me, I looked around - and McGruff was nowhere to be seen. I was like, oh, CRAP. Just a minute ago, he was there. But then he was gone.

I walked quickly in the direction in which I thought he had gone, and turned to ask random people, "Have you seen McGruff?" "Did McGruff go this way?" "I have got to get a picture with McGruff, where is he?" A couple of the Event planners pointed me outside the ballroom of the Press Club, stating that he had just walked out. And so I headed into the hallway where more people were milling about and talking, looked up and down in both directions, and still didn't see him. Was my dream of getting a picture taken with the only animal that could get away with saying "Help Take a Bite Out of Crime!" coming to a disappointing end? I asked another person, who pointed me in one direction. I moved even more quickly than before, sensing that time was of the essence. I asked another person, who said yes - she had just seen him - and he went around a corner down another hallway. Another hallway? This place was like a MAZE, and I could feel my hope slowly slipping away. But I said to myself, no...let's just do what we can to try to find him. Maybe this can still happen.

So I turned down that hallway, and noticed that it ended abruptly. ????? What the heck, I asked myself.... But I realized that the hallway ended in a door. With a sign on it. It was...the Men’s Room. McGruff was probably in the bathroom. With adrenaline coursing through my veins, I told myself that it’s now or never. I must accost the Crime Dog in order to make my miracle happen. I burst in, and saw that there was no one by the urinals. And then I turned my attention to the stalls, and saw a pair of shoes and legs in two stalls. One of them wasn't facing the toilet, or facing the opposite way....but was facing sideways. Brilliant deduction, I thought to myself - you can't go to the bathroom sideways, and so I bet that is McGruff, changing out of his costume! And almost every fiber of my being was shouting, "Let it go! Do not bother him! He's had a long day already!"...but I said, no, I promised this to myself, it will complete my day with perfection, I must at least ask. I must be bold.

And so I said, "McGruff, are you in here?" And a man's voice said, "Yes?" And so I said, "I don't want to inconvenience you at all...and I am not sure how far you've changed out of your costume, but it would mean a lot to me to get a picture with you." And he was like, "Well, I've already taken off my head and my paws...." And so I replied, "I understand. I really don't want to trouble you. I just really hoped for a picture." A wave of disappointment swept over me at that instance...but then he said, "Okay, no problem, it'll just take me a minute to put these back on again. We can do it." All of a sudden, I was filled with excitement again - it was going to happen! And so McGruff came out of the bathroom stall, with just his trenchcoat body on, and I saw that he was a normal, cool, laidback, scruffy young man. Kind of like me, on my days off. We chatted for a bit as he got himself together, and I once again conveyed how appreciative I was, and then we went outside (where a couple of people were laughing at my determination to make this picture happen) and took a couple of shots together. I think they came out GREAT, and I am honestly so thankful. This meant a lot to me, and I know McGruff recognized that. Mission accomplished! Hooray for Pap!!!! And, even more importantly, Hooray for the Crime Dog!!!!

PS Please don't make fun of the fact that my nametag is crooked. Yes, the photographer should have told me to fix that...but, frankly, a little bit of my dopeyness tends to surface in moments like these, and some would say it's endearing :)

Totally Unshocking Crime Headlines, Vol. 10

"[Nathaniel] Abraham arraigned on drug charges"

A refresher: In 1997, 11-year old Nathaniel Abraham shot and killed 18-year old Ronnie Greene, Jr. Two years later, at the age of 13, Abraham became one of the youngest people ever tried and convicted as an adult in the U.S. -- and the youngest ever in Michigan. Though tried as an adult, Abraham received a juvenile sentence in January 2000: he was incarcerated in a maximum-security juvenile detention facility until his 21st birthday, after which he was released in January of last year.

Naturally, at the time of his trial Abraham gained national (and international) notoriety, propelled in no small part by defense counsel Geoffrey Feiger. (Who can forget the image of an avuncular Feiger leading a cardigan-clad Abraham into court by hand? A stroke of theatrical brilliance if ever I saw one.) However, Abraham caused an equally big media stir last year for the outlandish outfit he wore upon his release, which many observers interpreted as a tasteless (and egomanical) taunt to the public. As if to underscore Abraham's prominence in the public consciousness, he was personally summoned by Oprah Winfrey to a private meeting with Greene's relatives, during which Winfrey convinced Abraham to apologize to the Greene family. Needless to say, this young man was under far more public scrutiny than the average recently-released offender.

However, Abraham also received far more benefits than the average recently-released offender as well -- namely, state-funded rent and college tuition:

[Abraham] is being given free services through a Foster Care Demonstration Project. The pilot program is designed to help Wayne County foster care children who are phased out of the system at age 18 but still need the support of the state....

Under the program, Abraham will be eligible for two years of free rent, full college tuition paid by Michigan Rehabilitation Services through age 25 and food stamps, which he has applied for. He must live in Michigan and attend college in the state to remain eligible in the program.

And yet. And yet. And yet last week he was picked up on drug charges -- specifically, possession with intent to distribute ecstasy:

Undercover officers were working surveillance at about 1 a.m. in the neighborhood where there had been three separate armed robberies recently, when one of them witnessed what appeared to be a drug sale between Abraham and a man on a bicycle.

Abraham, 22, had parked a red 1970 Cadillac convertible in the parking lot of a Sunoco station on North Perry Street just south of Pontiac Northern High School. After the officers witnessed the exchange, they called for additional officers and moved in on Abraham, who was standing behind the vehicle with the trunk open. As the officers approached, they asked to see Abraham’s hand, and he said he was just changing a tire.

“He didn’t see the guys coming up behind him, and he threw away a bag,” said Pontiac police Sgt. Kevin Braddock.

When officers recovered a purple Crown Royal liquor bag, they found inside 254 individual tablets of the street drug ecstasy. Police said the pills typically sell on the street for between $10 and $30 each. Abraham was arrested without incident, and the vehicle, which did have a flat, was impounded.

Since his release, the Michigan Department of Human Services has spent $1,200 on Abraham – money that helped him set up an apartment and paid his rent, said DHS spokeswoman Maureen Sorbet.

And really, how many people expected any other outcome? Though his mentors and supporters are "shocked and devastated" that Abraham failed to make good on his promise to stay clean (by -- what else? -- becoming a famous rapper), he exhibited many warning signs of failure:

Looking back on the year, Abraham says he tried college, one semester at Wayne State University last fall, but chose not to reapply to focus on his music. He is also writing stories that he hopes to put into a book.

Abraham has his own apartment in Oakland County and has worked a series of odd jobs, but has not taken any full-time employment.

So, all of this makes his arrest last week a complete and utter non-surprise. The only question is, who is to blame here? Is it Abraham himself, who has made incredibly poor choices even in the face of unparalleled social and economic support? Or the system itself, which treated a troubled boy (who committed a very serious crime, true) as a mature adult and incarcerated him for the bulk of his formative years? Or the news media, whose incessant coverage of his case granted an impressionable youngster instant celebrity status of the worst kind? Most likely the answer is "all of the above" -- not that attributions of blame make this case any less sad.

Crime & Justice Images in Advertising

I've been thinking lately about advertisers' use of crime-and-justice images to sell their products.

It all started when I saw this Swiffer television commercial the other day:



Certainly, the concept's not very original (note the heavy reliance upon Hollywood courtroom cliches: the suspenseful music, the judge's slight head cock to indicate her intent listening, the exaggerated "Objection!" and "Please point to the defendant!" phrases). But I was intrigued by the following sentencing pun: "Put your broom away for life". Witty, eh?

This made me think about another commercial from years ago for a bar soap alternative (exactly which product it was I can't remember for the life of me...Neutrogena? Noxema?) that made a similar pun: "Get out from behind bars".

All of this made me contemplate how entrenched the criminal justice system is in our public consciousness, to the point where images and phrases associated with it are used in everyday advertising. I was thinking that other examples of commercials using these types of crime-and-justice images might be useful for demonstrating to students how important an institution the criminal justice system is in our society. Anybody else have other examples? All I could come up with was the Hamburglar (he of the inmate stripes and burglar mask, natch).

Happy Gilmore, Crimefighter!

An article in today's New York Times discussed a recent study that yielded sure-to-be controversial findings: Rather than affirming the conventional wisdom that violent movies, TV shows, music, and video games promote violent behavior, the study -- conducted by two economists and presented at the American Economics Association annual meeting this weekend -- suggests that violent movies actually reduce violent crime:

[The authors concluded] that violent films prevent violent crime by attracting would-be assailants and keeping them cloistered in darkened, alcohol-free environs. Instead of fueling up at bars and then roaming around looking for trouble, potential criminals pass the prime hours for mayhem eating popcorn and watching celluloid villains slay in their stead.

The article describes the two competing schools of thought (i.e., violent entertainment begets violent behavior vs. violent entertainment diverts violent behavior), and offers analysis from experts on both sides.

Interested in the researchers' data and methodology? Here you go:

The study’s authors acknowledge that their research does not...address the long-term effects of exposure to violent media, an influence they view as pernicious. Rather, the research uses a decade of national crime reports, cinema ratings and movie audience data to examine what has happened to rates of violent crime during and immediately after violent films are shown.

This article leaves me with some methodological questions, most of which cannot be sufficiently answered without seeing the original study. However, this parting comment from one of the study's co-authors had me chuckling so much I forgot my methodological queries:

In other words, Professor Dahl suggested, Hollywood could help cut crime in more palatable fashion by cutting out the gore while making movies that still attract male teenagers and 20-somethings.

“We need more Adam Sandler movies,” he said. “Even though I’m not a big fan of Adam Sandler, that’s the implication.”

I tell you one thing: I am in the wrong line of work. I need to become an economist so that I can produce research with policy implications like "make more Adam Sandler movies"!

Thanks to EW.com for the heads up.

P.S. I wonder whether Bob Barker would agree with Dr. Dahl's categorization of Adam Sandler movies as non-violent? Ha Ha!

More on Sean Taylor

The NY Kid recently wrote eloquently about the media's characterization of Sean Taylor as a "thug". This week's Newsweek features an editorial by Raina Kelley about this very subject, which some of you may be interested to read. You can find it here.

Again with the Media

You may have heard about this story:

Emily Sander, an 18-year-old college student in Kansas went missing last Friday. Authorities believe they have found her body, and that she was murdered by a man with whom she was seen on Friday night. It seems she was also involved in Internet porn during her college studies. A headline on the main page of MSNBC.com tonight reads:

"Police: Body Likely Missing Porn Star"

Do they really need to refer to her in that way? I'm not sure why this is so upsetting to me--I suppose it is an accurate description. Maybe as a parent I'm particularly struck by this insensitivity, and how her parents have to deal with this characterization of their daughter. Given that sex workers seem to be viewed as somehow "deserving" of their victimization, this may be viewed as an attempt to dehumanize her.

We'll see what happens when they make arrests, and how the defense attorney presents the argument for the accused. Hopefully it won't end similarly to this case.

Violence and the American Athlete - RIP Sean Taylor

For those of you who are unaware, Washington Redskins free safety Sean Taylor died this morning after being shot in the upper thigh sometime last night during what is being called a robbery. The only shot that hit Taylor severed his femoral artery, leading to a great deal of blood loss. Although he slipped into what appeared to be a coma, it is being reported that at some point during the early morning hours, Taylor managed to squeeze the hand of his nurse. He never regained consciousness, however, and the world lost another young black male due to gun violence.

The point has already been made all over the internet, and perhaps rightfully so, that his death is not unique in that young black males die due to gun violence every day in America. So what makes hundreds (perhaps thousands) of people who have never met Sean Taylor so despondent about the situation? Put simply, he was "their" player - either at "Tha U" (University of Miami) or for the Redskins. Unfortunately, Sean Taylor is no longer quite so unique as a professional athlete either. Darrent Williams was gunned down last New Year's Eve; both Antoine Walker and Eddy Curry were held at gunpoint and robbed in their own homes. While these things happen everyday, millionaire athletes are obviously more visible, and thus the media pick up on these events.

Perhaps the saddest part of the Sean Taylor murder is all of the conjecture surrounding the incident - not because of the conjecture itself, but rather due to some of the vitriol that it spurs. Sean Taylor (whose father happens to be the chief of police in a small Florida town) is known to have associated with some pretty questionable characters and to have displayed some questionable decision-making on the field. It also now appears that several days before his murder, someone broke into his home and left a kitchen knife on his bed in what would seem to be a menacing message. Although we do not know what happened in Sean Taylor's home the night of his murder, it would not be surprising if Sean was murdered, rather than shot during an aborted burglary attempt. The shame of this situation is that almost everyone who knew Sean personally has admitted that while he was immature over the past several years, he had become a different person since the birth of his child and was trying to distance himself from any dangerous friends and activities. Despite this, there has been an astounding amount of commentary on the internet (particularly in the comments section of the ESPN story on his murder) along the lines of "he was a thug and deserved it". Some of this is simply racist idiots trying to stir up trouble, but quite a bit appears to be sincere, which may be even more unnerving. That is, rather than some racist rant, it appears that many of these commenters believe that Sean's death was simply a matter of his past catching up to him, and that he deserved it because of his past. While the former may be true, the latter certainly is not.

Sean Taylor's death is merely the latest high-profile crime against a rich athlete, but it is so much more than that to his family and friends. It represents something far worse - the silencing of a bright future both professionally (in the NFL) and personally (with his family). Yes, young black males are gunned down every day, and the fact that he was a rich athlete does not make Sean Taylor more important than anyone else. But we should use the fact that his death is so visible to really examine what it means to "be a thug" or to "come from the wrong neighborhood", and figure out how we can protect the next generation of potential victims.

The FCC, National Media, and Violence Against Women

Amanda's heart-wrenching post about domestic violence made me think more about the representation of these cases in the media, and how we come to know about victimization in America. Is there anyone who doesn't know the names Natalee Hollway, Laci Peterson, and now Stacy Peterson? Thanks to CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, we are inundated with stories about these young, sad victims of crime--all likely killed at the hands of men.

Of course, it is very helpful for us to know about these cases. It is desperately important that the public recognize the prevalence and seriousness of domestic abuse and domestic homicide. Unfortunately, the media is quite selective about which stories make it to airtime--after all, every second is valuable, right? (I plant tongue firmly in cheek as I consider the minute-by-minute Anna Nicole Death Coverage and it's "value" to the citizens of the world.)

While it is helpful for the media to present these stories and educate the world about DV, it is also quite unnerving to know that the cases presented to the public are selectively screened. While stories such as those of Laci Peterson, Natalee Holloway, and Stacy Peterson will continue to make headlines (and feature live "on-site" broadcasts from Greta V.S. & Nancy Grace), the stories of women like LaToya Figeroa, Reyna Alvarado-Carrera and Tamika Hudson will never be told. It turns out there's some truth to "missing white woman syndrome", even though it is virtually impossible to collect meaningful data on the practice.

This is something I've been ranting about for some time--in class I ask my students to raise their hand if they've heard of Laci Peterson, then keep it up if they've heard of LaToya Figeroa--both disappeared while pregnant, both killed by the father of their unborn child. One makes the national news instantly, one finally gets a few minutes of time on CNN after bloggers and families bombard the networks with email.

Unfortunately, upcoming events suggest this practice will only get worse. The current chairman of the FCC is planning to lift restrictions that keep media conglomerates from owning more than one television network or newspaper per market. In theory, the news media could be run by all 6 (or fewer) mega-corporations in the next couple of years. Rupert Murdoch will be in heaven.

What does this mean? The conglomeration of big media will lead to even more selective news, and finally to censorship. We will hear more stories about victimized women who are attractive, white, and middle-class. Minority women and those in the lower classes will continue to be ignored by big media because their stories do not bring ratings, thus their lives are not as valuable. Good bye, diversity; hello, McAmerica (or maybe Disneymerica®--I can't decide which I like better).

If you feel as strongly as I do about this, visit http://stopbigmedia.com and write to the FCC opposing this change: http://www.fcc.gov/contacts.html