"Heartbreakingly pretty"

[2beesornot2beesthatisthehoney]

Watching ITN news right now. Tragic awful story about the death of a young girl. Teenager helping with enquiries I think. Anyhow the point at which I thought FFS was when a picture was shown of the young girl whose death was described as "all the more tragic" because she was "heartbreakingly pretty". It would be sad whatever , not because of how she looks. It's a terrible story but what a comment by the reporter?
AIBU?

The expression "all the more tragic" should be avoided. Surely no one can argue with that.

Journalists and tv broadcasters have free rein, apparently.

Maybe it's time they were reined in.

Derxa as I said above, it's the fact that the reporter said this less than a day after the death, which was a tragedy anyway, that means now is exactly the right time to discuss it.

Anyway, if in a fortnight OP had started a thread saying 'hey, I've been thinking about the child murder in York and a reporter's comments just after it....' then I'm pretty sure the responses from those who find critical discussion of the media distasteful would have been the same.

Personally speaking I think the constant emoting on news broadcasts is disgraceful. What happened to reporting the facts?

All that aside, if it had been my little girl who had been brutally murdered, it might have been strangely comforting to hear that she was 'heartbreakingly pretty'. Who knows? I'm not the one who has to deal with a tragedy.
I hope that no one that loves that little girl ever gets to read this thread.

'White woman syndrome'. You can see it now - there's a missing airman but there's been little publicity about it. But other 'groups' are more likely to be more likely to be in the media.

The language used by the media reveals so much hidden bias and value judgements.

The little girl went to a school just around the corner from my house. This incident happened a few miles from my house. Such an awful thing to happen. RIP Katie.

But why do you decide when the time is appropriate itsmine? HQ have already said it's ok to discuss the issue around the reporting. They haven't said leave it a couple of weeks.

But you can't demand a certain time frame of when it's ok to discuss certain things itsmine - the op was bringing it up precisely because it had just been said - if she brought it up several weeks later it would seem a bit irrelevant.

I also seriously doubt that the family of the victim will be going on mumsnet to see what a bunch of randoms think about the ITN news report.

Forgive me if I end up posting twice,my phone's playing up-

Can you imagine if your child has been murdered and you came across a bunch of women saying shit like this about her/him?

Apart from ONE poster who made a comment that I can't believe they thought was appropriate no one is 'saying shit' about about the crime. We're discussing the language the reporter used.

Can you not see that?

Itsmine HQ have agreed as well and are allowing this thread- why don't you email them and tell them they are wrong instead of keep trying to shut down the conversation?

Bertrand- I remeber that thread - bubbly boy

They had been loads of publicity about the missing airman - in mit saying white wiman syndrome doesn't exist (and I'd argue that a person's social class is more salient in this value judgements than their ethnicity) but saying there has been 'little publicity' about him is untrue.

You are of course entitled to your opinion itsmine - however I believe you are simply reacting to the crime itself, (understandably) and not looking the the bigger picture of why the op started the thread initially.

Which is That the way a person looked/their physical attributes should not come into the reporting of a crime

If now is not the time to discuss it (after it has just been said on the ITN news report that it is "all the more heartbreaking as she was heartbreakingly pretty") then I don't know when it will ever be the time.

I don't get all the handwringing about the timing of this thread. Do people imagine that Katie's death won't be so tragic in a few weeks, or months, or years time? That her family will be over it then?

This thread is valid now because the reporting of this little girl's death is happening now. In a few weeks or months most of us will have forgotten her, forgotten what was said and the news will have moved on to the next tragedy.

I remember when I told a manager that my baby dd had just been diagnosed deaf and she looked absolutely distraught and blurted out "Such a shame, seeing as she is so pretty!"

But if the mum were to see this thread, she might well think- 'my daughter was gorgeous, but she had far, far more to offer the world than her looks'.

I think the decent thing to do, would be for the reporter to apologise. He may have been lost for words and it's not hard to see he might have been affected by this tragedy so I don't believe he actually thought through what he said, just messed up. So perhaps apologise and move on.

I very much doubt the parents or family are casually browsing Mumsnet right now.

I don't think he said it accidentally. What's going on in his subconscious for him to say such a thing?. Maybe the culture we live in has something to do with it.

I wonder if he is now kicking himself, or he still doesn't realise the implications of what he said.

I totally agree with noodle and Fallon

Be outraged at the murder and at the murderer of a little girl. Yes it was a daft comment by the reporter but not malicious . Sadly you seen more outraged by that comment than by the horrific murder of Katie. Then there's people mentioning their own daughters award ceremony and the sexism involved , ffs!

This thread is in very poor taste indeed.

I can't even get my head around the events that's led up to the death of this child.
And as for what this family is going through right now...truly heartbreaking for them all.