Missing White Women Syndrome [MWWS]
“Missing white woman syndrome (MWWS), also known as missing pretty girl syndrome, is a term used to describe alleged disproportionate media coverage of white female victims” Source http://www.wikipedia.org
Are you aware that an excess of 800,000 children are reported missing each year, and another 500,000 go missing without ever being reported? Now which cases do we see on the news?
[Children are focused on in this blog because I can relate the topic to a current media story]
I think I’ll go with the current one: Madeleine McCann. She’s 3, a cute little innocent girl, snatched from her bed in the middle of the night. Normally media coverage portrays the victim as feeble and innocent, and often this is wrong, but she’s 3 and probably what she’s portrayed as.
In his 17 May column in, the former head of Portugal's bar association. José Miguel Júdice, you’ve probably not heard of him but his column is in Portugal's Público newspaper and he was quoted, that the enormous mobilisation was due to the fact that the little girl "is English, white, and the daughter of doctors."
This is a subject you have to think of it without considering any specific victim; I just used her as an example. If on the same day a cute little blonde 12 year old and a ‘media ugly’ 54 year old man went missing, think who would get the publicity?
Hannah Williams and Danielle Jones. Two teenagers that went missing, although both are female teenagers they were given different treatment. Hannah was from a model middle-class and a typical school girl, while Danielle was from estranged parents with a working class background and a nose ring. Even “The National Missing Persons Helpline” has commented on MWWS, they have agreed that the typical white woman will be given more attention than a different or weird girl.
We also have the story of two women, captured in March 23 2003 in Iraq during an ambush. First we have the woman with the least media coverage; Shoshana Johnson, a single black mother. Meanwhile there was Jessica Lynch, a young blonde white woman who had all the attention thrust upon her. Another case of MWWS.
Now I know that the media goes with the story that will get them the most money, but I can’t help but thinking how wrong this is. Scan your memory and the papers, most victims you here of are young females, maybe sometimes pregnant, pretty and from a quite decent lifestyle.
Thanks For Reading.x
[A lot of information has been found on Wikipedia and most has been backed up by other sources.]
Are you aware that an excess of 800,000 children are reported missing each year, and another 500,000 go missing without ever being reported? Now which cases do we see on the news?
[Children are focused on in this blog because I can relate the topic to a current media story]
I think I’ll go with the current one: Madeleine McCann. She’s 3, a cute little innocent girl, snatched from her bed in the middle of the night. Normally media coverage portrays the victim as feeble and innocent, and often this is wrong, but she’s 3 and probably what she’s portrayed as.
In his 17 May column in, the former head of Portugal's bar association. José Miguel Júdice, you’ve probably not heard of him but his column is in Portugal's Público newspaper and he was quoted, that the enormous mobilisation was due to the fact that the little girl "is English, white, and the daughter of doctors."
This is a subject you have to think of it without considering any specific victim; I just used her as an example. If on the same day a cute little blonde 12 year old and a ‘media ugly’ 54 year old man went missing, think who would get the publicity?
Hannah Williams and Danielle Jones. Two teenagers that went missing, although both are female teenagers they were given different treatment. Hannah was from a model middle-class and a typical school girl, while Danielle was from estranged parents with a working class background and a nose ring. Even “The National Missing Persons Helpline” has commented on MWWS, they have agreed that the typical white woman will be given more attention than a different or weird girl.
We also have the story of two women, captured in March 23 2003 in Iraq during an ambush. First we have the woman with the least media coverage; Shoshana Johnson, a single black mother. Meanwhile there was Jessica Lynch, a young blonde white woman who had all the attention thrust upon her. Another case of MWWS.
Now I know that the media goes with the story that will get them the most money, but I can’t help but thinking how wrong this is. Scan your memory and the papers, most victims you here of are young females, maybe sometimes pregnant, pretty and from a quite decent lifestyle.
Thanks For Reading.x
[A lot of information has been found on Wikipedia and most has been backed up by other sources.]
I've never thought about this before, but it's completly true.
As Love said, it's only about the money and that's why it's so out of order.
EvilGiraffe!, July 3rd, 2007 at 12:57:54pm
It is true, white women and children are focused on in the media far more often. It is sad that thousands of children go missing all over the world each year and no one in the media gives much attention to this. Occasionally a 15 minute segment regarding child prostitution or slavery comes up on programmes like 60 minutes, but nothing is done about this on an international level. Unfortunately, I presume this is because the majority of these missing people come from Africa and Asia. In many cases though, as terrible as it may seem to us, their own governments, their own people don't value their lives as highly as western societies do. The sad fact regarding media coverage is that beautiful white women with a tragic story sell.
Grandma, July 1st, 2007 at 04:55:11am
it is so wrong.
it's not about the people and their destiny, its about money. thats just sad
Love, June 30th, 2007 at 04:02:02pm