To be shocked at Sky News' coverage of the excavations in Praia Da Luiz?

[ziggiestardust]

I didn't see a lot of the initial coverage, as I was working abroad in 2007. But the Police are potentially excavating a little girl's body, regardless of the circumstances, and they've got live cameras at the scene, waiting. It's macabre, and it seems like regardless of the fact MM was a tiny little defenceless girl, she's fair game for the media.

I just think it's shitty. Do a quick piece on it, but is there any need for the close ups of the excavation site and a blow by blow account of what's happening?

Her poor family

Media Coverage of the event is fine - I can understand the local uproar regarding tourism etc, but the actual media coverage is fine.

As you can see, on this thread - the divided opinions still mean that this is very much in the public interests (morbid or not), and the huge amount of doubt surrounding who/why etc means that it needs to be bang in the forefront of TV coverage.

• Me too - apologies also - personal opinion, high profile case

In the US they reckon there are 115 "stereotypical kidnap" cases a year. If you go onto the Missing Persons website you will see that rare as it is, there are a lot of missing cases that haven't been as widely publicised as this one.

I wasn't arguing just relaying from book

I'm not sure that people feeling interested equates to the public interest. The public interest is in where the public stand to benefit from hearing something or stand to be disadvantaged by not hearing it. So I'm not sure how this case really meets those criteria although Madame has said something compelling about social contract, the police and the need for investigation. However, that is by the by.

The objection I and others who have objected to this coverage is not to the fact of it's being covered but the manner in which that coverage has been conducted. To me, the central question is do we need to witness at first hand in real time the excavations? Do we need to know before actually interested persons (family and friends who are not there) are informed of any outcome? My view is that the reason that this is being done at this time and in this way is driven by commercial interests rather than the demands of democratic accountability and transparency. I have not seen anyone offer a counter argument to that. Does anyone really believe it's being done with the public good and not commercial interests at heart?

I suppose it may satisfy those who think there have been cover ups anything hidden etc as this is all very much 'out there' for all to see.

I don't think we really need to see the same footage of windswept scrubland being looked over bulletin after bulletin.

I was quite surprised yesterday when at 6.30am John Humphries on R4 announced a newsflash re MM and it was merely to say scrubland was being searched. I held my breath for the first 2 seconds thinking hell what has happened. Fgs even on a respected news programme like Today?

Just tell us when there is some actual news.

Sky news always reports like this

I haven't read the thread but yes OP you are being unreasonable. This is News Intl we are talking about, the same organisation which hacked Milile Dowler's phone. Why is anyone surprised ?

"it may satisfy those who think there have been cover ups..."

I'm not convinced that it will. If you see cover up everywhere then you see it everywhere. Also, Baudrillard No mediatised event is transparent, though this one has particularly compelling truth claims in that it really seems to be 'real' or 'truthful' but that is due to the style of the presentation rather than the actual veracity of what is presented.

Also, why is satisfying those people in the public interest?

Have to agree with OutsSelf, it's ghoulish. We don't need to see it.

The difficulty is that the media will use 'public interest' defence in ways which are absolutely justifiable ie: Edward Snowdon.

And get you get this 24 hour rolling news coverage which is clearly more in the commercial interests of the broadcaster.

But I wouldn't want it regulated because every 'public interest' case is different.

So you gave to rely on the ethics if the broadcaster. And to some it's somewhere east of London

I agree that there are public interest arguments for press activity. But I don't think we should just accept that the blanket principle of public interest mitigates any possibility that we question or critique the media role in individual cases. It's so cynical, and such an abuse of journalistic freedoms. And it will continue unless we do critique it.

I would love to see some sort of disclosure wrt how much financially this coverage has been worth to Sky and other broadcasters. I'm sure the figures are nebulous and difficult in a precise way to evidence, but if we are going to use arguments about transparency and accountability, then all of the relevant interests including commercial interests, should be part of the debate, be in the public domain.

I agree. If journalism is going to see itself as a profession rather than a trade then it needs some accountability.

But it just seems unworkable without gagging legitimate reporting which is unpopular with the establishment but of legitimate public interest concern.

I don't think this particular coverage should be banned or curtailed. But it's only defence is that to stop it would set a precedent which might curb other stories which have greater legitimacy.

Well I suppose as a commercial enterprise Sky would not commit so many resources to this excavation if audience figures weren't good enough . Which shows there is an appetite for it.

I sometimes wonder if 'public interest' has come to mean 'the public is interested in it'

I'm really not seeing the outrage over this. Who is it hurting? The most I can see is damage to the local tourism board who must wish this would go away and people here who are bleating about public interest/interest to the public and dark things about Sky and evil journalists.

If there is any criticism to be made, I'd aim most of it at the local Portuguese force and Met Police who have orchestrated this. If they wanted to make this search private, they could do it. They could set up a wide exclusion zone and use powers of arrest to enforce it.

They haven't. The reporters seem to be very close and are being briefed, not with any real details, because I don't think there are any to be had, but just enough to keep them interested. So what do you expect them to do?

That said, I don't blame the police that much either.

My guess is that they want to make it look like they are doing something and it is silly season and I believe the anniversary of Madeleine's disappearance, so it's win-win for everyone involved. It's a news creation and management situation.

We've seen it countless times before, last week in my local area the police invited camera crews to follow them on a 5am drug raid to show that they were doing something.

I find this search less distressing than Greater Manchester Police inviting reporters to follow them on various wild goose chases on Saddleworth Moor while searching for Keith Bennett's body. Those were publicity stunts that I found far crueller to Keith's mother, than this one is to the McCanns.

Before anyone accuses me of indulging in a league table of grief, I'm not. I think the McCanns want to keep the search alive and Winnie Johnson did too, although she accepted her child was dead and wanted his body back.

I feel desperately sorry for them both, but a part of me felt sorrier for Winnie, which is irrational and does not mean that I blame the McCanns. I don't. They don't need me to tell them they made a mistake.

But I would not presume to condemn those Saddleworth Moor antics. Winnie Johnson desperately wanted her son's body back and so wanted those things to happen, no matter how futile we could see it. Seen in that light, I find this squeamishness over decorum revolting.

Agree with limited completely Good post

I think the police point of view is usually that it's better to have the press in the tent pissing out.
I don't think anyone has questioned whether this should be covered - but 24 - hour news coverage? Hours of speculation and misinformation? 'Experts' dug up to give their view when they are as clueless as anyone else?
I don't think of that as journalism.

Well, limited, I have said over the course of several posts above why I think it is harmful to process this kind of event by means of infotainment. Perhaps as a journo you have seen a great deal of horror and tragedy and you are hardened to it. But I think that hardening to the face of human suffering is a form of damage, and I think the mediatisation of news events of this sort in this way promotes a widespread hardening, a widespread damage for our capacity to feel empathy.

That you are so aggressively annoyed by objections being raised here suggests a certain lack of empathy on your part. Which is rather making my point for me.

"It's a win-win for everyone involved."

It is statements like this that make you sound utterly lacking in empathy.

"Who is hurting?"

Aside from the obvious?

Show me a parent who is watching this and I'll show you someone who is hurting about this. There is no way you can watch this and not either:

have your capacity to assess actual risk (and concordant anxiety) threatened;
shut yourself down to empathising with that little girl (lots of people have openly hoped she is dead, because the alternative seems unbearable);
shut yourself down to empathising with the parent as a sort of psychological self protection (witness the bile upthread for her f&f)

This coverage proliferates grief, suspicion, anxiety; it invites us to save ourselves from it by processing it as an entertainment event. Why do you think that harmless? Why do you have so little empathy for the shock and revulsion others have for this?

What I expect reporters to do is exercise some sort of moral judgement, some sort of critical self reflection. Especially when they use arguments about the public good, or the role of a free press in democracy. If you want to be a defender of righteousness and good, start behaving righteously.

Outself

What I expect reporters to do is exercise some sort of moral judgement, some sort of critical self reflection

That's the triumph of hope over experience, isn't it?