Two images dominated the news media these past few weeks: boy scouts missing in rough terrain, and white damsels in distress.
I find this interesting.
When you spend a lot of time reading about missing people, as I do, you know that missing persons come in all shapes, sizes, colors, and genders. They disappear from parking lots, crashed cars, sidewalks, driveways, and even their own beds. Sometimes, they run away. Sometimes, they commit suicide. Other times, the worst possible violence wipes them from this earth. And then there are kids sold into slavery of all forms. The list is endless.
Some have suggested that white damsels dominate the airwaves because a racist media is more interested in white victims. This is most definitely true. When was the last time you saw a missing African-American flashed on television screens across the United States? It seems the media simply does not care about non-white victims/missing people.
Something else may be at work at the same time - a certain kind of sexism, perhaps. Sexism so deep it transforms into an expectation - a kind of control mechanism (though no conscious design may be present.) For when the media insist on showing woman after woman who simply vanishes, it begins to feel like that is what women do: they vanish. Let this be a warning swims below the surface, the subtext as terrifying as a shark.
For example, why hasn't the case of missing prosecutor Ray Gricar received more attention? His Mini-Cooper was located at the far end of a parking lot, but no signs of Ray (with the exception of many incredible, and a few credible sightings) have appeared anywhere. Why doesn't his case grip media attention? Why no media obsession?
I think it is because he is a man, and in our culture that fact strikes even a violence-drenched media as strange. Men are not victims; women are. We (meaning, we as a culture) are comfortable with the idea that women are always in danger, always potential victims, always in need of rescue. And so the media feeds us precisely that. They flash the images so often it begins to feel like a control mechanism, keeping women in fear. Or maybe even a prophecy. Or warning.
Which is not to say those images should not be shown. On the contrary, why not show as many different people - from as many different walks of life - as possible? It would solve more cases.
The Boy Scouts were a rare exception to the damsel-in-distress syndrome. Why? Perhaps because they went missing out in nature - and not only that, but in rugged terrain. This narrative matched cultural constructions for gender: these boys were not victims so much as
brave explorers who headed into dangerous terrain and got lost. So the media felt comfortable airing their stories over and over.
I was glad the Boy Scout cases received attention. But I also wondered how media attention could help their cases at all, since the boys were most definitely inside the wilderness boundaries, and search teams were already looking. It was not as if we could spot them at a local supermarket and call police. It was not as if we could call in with a tip. Why not spend some precious air time on cases in which national media exposure could actually make a difference? (Cases like kidnappings or endangered children. Or images of most wanted people, or people believed to have taken a child?)
I have also noticed: When the Boy Scouts went missing, the media kept calling them "missing Boy Scouts," whereas women are rarely referred to by profession. You rarely (if ever) hear, "the missing artist ..." or "the missing doctor ..." in relation to a missing woman. The one exception is when a missing woman danced in a nude bar or worked as prostitute. Then the media will make sure to let you know, repeating it over and over. Somehow, that strikes them as the one case where profession matters for missing women. (Can we say cultural stereotype?)
None of this is to say that any kind of missing person case has more inherent value or drama or loss. Every case is a tragedy. Every case represents a terrible loss, as well as an almost heroic clinging to hope - an unbreakable faith on the part of those left behind.
All missing people deserve media attention - especially those cases where media attention can actually make a difference.
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All that said, there is also the strange reality that some cases just grab you and never let go. Certan cases just get under my skin, and I do not know why. Why do some faces haunt me, while others do not? I will have to explore that issue further.