I think that one of the main reasons why this case has continued to be discussed is because of the unusual nature of it.
When the story first broke, apart from the that a young child had disappeared from a holiday apartment, there was also the disbelief that it is apparently fairly common for parents to leave small children unsupervised in certain holiday resorts while they go to dinner. Whether people discussed it or not, I think that most parents have been horrified that such small children were left alone, as generally, leaving such small children is not considered to be the done thing.
Once the discussions of the rights/wrongs of leaving small children had died down, people were then faced with the possibility that this child had been abducted by paedophiles. Not just randomly abducted, but that she had been earmarked for abduction some time before, perhaps even in the UK, and that she had been snatched during a carefully planned operation. As parents we all know that paedophiles exist, we have either, or will at some point, talk to our children about strangers, teach them to have common sense and to be careful etc, but the thought of these paedophile rings is alien to most of us. I think to some it has caused increased fear that if someone could have targeted this one child like this who knows who is watching their children and planning when to abduct them, and to the rest there is an increased disbelief that these rings actually would go to such lengths when there are far easier ways to abduct a child, ie off the beach/or a homeless child off the street.
And then there has been the Mccanns? desire to keep this case in the media. But we?ve not actually been hearing about the search for Madeleine, we?ve been hearing about the Mccanns? visit to this church, and that shrine, their trip to the Vatican etc. It?s only really since the couple have been named as suspects that the spotlight has really fallen back on what might have happened to Madeleine. And at this point the opinion has been hugely divided between those that think it is totally inappropriate to have the opinion that the parents might have been involved in any way, those that sympathised with the parents at first and now feel that they have been tricked into believing they were innocent, and those that thought all along that the parents were in some way involved.
I think if Madeleine Mccann had ddisappeared off a beach there wouldn?t have been nearly this much media coverage, even with the parents? involvement, because she wouldn?t have been the first child to have disappeared off a beach, but she?s probably one of the first to disappear from a holiday apartment while no-one was looking after her.
And by exposing themselves to the media, Gerry and Kate Mccann have unfortunately brought the bad publicity on themselves as well as the good. Not their faults necessarily, however, as they?ve had a PR consultant he/she would have been aware of that and should have advised the family better.
While this case is in the media, people will continue to discuss it, if the media stopped reporting tomorrow people will have moved on by next week.
I can?t explain why people are googling for information and emailing the police with random photo?s though as I personally find that odd as well.
As for Rees Jones, while his death was a horrific tradgedy and should never have happened, imo people don?t seem as drawn to that because it?s been fairly widely reported that he was probably in the way of what should have been a gang shooting. Sadly, he was a victim of our increasingly violent society. Maybe rather than annallising that, we should be asking why society has sunk to this level though.