For years I have been interested in how society deals with issues of race and gender. Simply speaking for brevity, one of the main things I learned was that society treats these two areas essentially in the same fashion. The two main focuses are blacks and females who are victims and whites and males who are perpetrators. Institutions, laws and organizations for these two groups of victims are set strongly in place with no signs of slowing in growth and support. Considering humans love their fairy tales the concept of the arch enemy is needed and as such we have the perpetrators who are whites and males. And as such any groups for whites from the onset are deemed racist as well as any groups for males are from the onset deemed sexist. And so with any good fairy tale there is well crafted propaganda. Enter the media.
When I first heard of the James DiMaggio case my reaction was one of immediate skepticism based merely on how the story was being spun. There are two stereotypical moulds the majority of the media will cast a story in when it involves certain groups. In its simplest form; blacks and females are the victims, whites and males are the perpetrators. The case of George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin was created, cast in its typical mould of black victimhood, sold and bought very easily by the public. Yet there is a significant difference in the James Dimaggio/Hannah Anderson case. That case was cast into the stereotypical mould of the creepy male predator nearly right from the beginning, crafted and sold as it always has been yet if you take the time to scan the landscape of public reaction you find they are not buying.
Why is there disconnect in public reaction? Someone questions this very thing but I will add this question comes off to me as more of a rhetorical guilt trip of conformity as if to say “What’s wrong with all of you? Why can’t you see Hannah as a victim like you did with Trayvon?” And notice the factors of age, gender and race are at play within the question.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/16/hannah-anderson-kidnappin_n_3769828.html
The Trayvonite’s answer is stunning to me in that if that is true then why could that Trayvonite, along with so many of the others not do the same for the Zimmerman case? Why could they not question the stereotypical story being sold to them with that same critical eye they now give to the DiMaggio case?
My initial thoughts at this moment as to why there is a disconnect in the public reaction is mainly two-fold. There has been significant push back and growing negative reaction to feminism. People are just simply not buying the stereotypical victimhood of females being sold. It appears to me there has been some sort of societal shift, a tipping point if you will; I suppose the cliché of the boy who cried wolf may also be a factor. However I think the second significant factor at play here is race. Within that context there is a two-fold factor. One factor is race trumps gender. Another factor is Hannah is white. So if we take Zimmerman/Martin and contrast with DiMaggio/Anderson, Trayvon beats Hannah in victimhood simply because one is black the other white.
I believe the Zimmerman case may be the beginning towards a societal shift regarding black victimhood and grievance. Again of course the cliché boy who cried wolf also a factor, the race card worn thin, lays in tatters. Perhaps within the next twenty years or so the next Zimmermanesque story, race case, the media tries to sell will garner the same public reaction of near immediate skepticism as we will no doubt see in the next Hannahesque, gender case. And instead of becoming the mythical institution/religion the Trayvon Martin case has become it will merely be a another flash in the pan of a dying media and a dying legacy of pseudo victimhood.
Posted at the IAIWM as well: http://iaiwm.wordpress.com/
DiwataMan 
I sure hope you are right, but what really disturbs me is that even lesser matters tend to be handled both by LE and the courts along stereotypical lines, and that with lesser crimes the defendant feels it is better to just take what ever plea bargain is offered. In other words, the degree to which justice is even honestly attempted is directly related to the seriousness of the charge. To get embroiled in our legal system in our time, is a crap shoot….
Another reason that may have given people pause when assessing the Anderson narrative is our recent experience with so much misinformation being reported in the Zimmerman case that turned out not the be right.
We are getting to know with example after example, what gets reported initially usually is not accurate. Best to hold your opinion and get more facts that can be verified.
I actually don’t agree. I’ve seen people express that same sentiment regarding the media throughout the entire Zimmerman case. Now while it is true the media often gets things wrong early in a case, and even throughout, we should not confuse that with a purposefully directed story that is being sold. The former can often be understandably taken as simple mistakes, haste in wanting to be the first, etc. but the latter is nefarious. To conflate understandable mistakes with directed effort diminishes the point.
This translates to the public reaction. They have not withheld opinion in either story yet one is accepted as gospel and the other is being questioned.
This
That is all.
This is very interesting. I hadn’t given any thought to the difference in how the public is reacting to Hannah vs. Trayvon. I sure hope you’re right, D-man, that the Zimmerman case could set off a societal shift away from the victimhood/grievance industry.
I have a few half-formed ramblings to offer, FWIW. One, there’s no Scheme Team out there spinning all manner of lies on Hannah’s behalf. No Gloria Allred. And while Hannah’s dad jumped too quickly to chat with media for my taste, so far I haven’t seen any evidence he’s trademarking names, setting up foundations, doing trashcan tours or becoming a minor celebrity spokesman on behalf of kidnapped teenage girls.
There’s something else at work I think. Women — despite what the feministas would have everyone believe — are quick to suspect and judge other females. By contrast, blacks tend to stand together in solidarity no matter what, and the white guilt crowd will always stand with them so as to avoid being accused of being the R-word. There’s no equivalent of “racist” to hold over the heads of those who speak out with suspicions about Hannah. We should never underestimate the power of the threat of being labeled racist.
For me, what both the Trayvon and Hannah situations seem to have in common is lousy parenting and lack of accountability. I don’t have many confirmed details on the Hannah case, other than she apparently took overnight trips with DiMaggio, and members of her family were presumably aware he had a thing for her. I don’t know what Hannah’s parents were thinking to allow their teenage daughter to take trips alone with an adult male “friend of the family” who had a thing for her, just as I don’t know why $ybrina and Fruit thought it was just fine to allow their delinquent son on his 3rd school suspension to wander the streets after dark unsupervised.
I’m going to span out more but I think the HuffPo is a great place to see the stark contrast. Look at early reports on the Zimmerman case and see how the reactions fall right in line with the ideology and contrast with the comments on the HuffPo articles in the Hannah case and they are for the most part non conformist.
I have to disagree with you on the feministas. They will tell you that women are quick to suspect and judge other females because of males/the patriarchy pitting them against one another as it relates to beauty and competition for males. Just like it’s always white peoples fault it will always be the males fault, ultimately anyway. That’s why you get the radfem’s growing out their armpit hairs and shit, lol.
I also have to disagree with your sentiment of there being no equivalent of “racist” to hold over the heads of those who speak out with suspicions about Hannah, sexist is the word and it is just as guilt trippy as racist. Those who speak out may even be called pedophiles themselves which certainly still plays today. Although I will say “sexist” is not as powerful “racist”. Either way many don’t want to be labeled either and that’s why we have the equivalent of the males being feminists rather than considering their own just like with whites who do the same for blacks, Tim Wise often comes to mind, lol, although I think he’s Jewish pretending to be white or something, lol.
Ultimately, in both scenarios, what get’s lost is the truth. I think I have in my folder everything that is publicly know about the DiMaggio case. I think things really blew up when Hannah spoke out and there were problems with what she said and what we know happened and also there was a DNA test kit found in the mothers car and used condoms found and such, oh my. Yet because Hannah is automatically assumed victim because of her gender with the dynamic of the male creeper then why even bother looking, we have our boogieman and he’s dead seems to be the position of authorities.
Two corrections needed with your commentary. From my reading of the situation with Hannah Anderson, her parents were not living together. At least that is the impression I got from skimming the story.
Second, $ybrina Fulton and Fruit were not a couple when Trayvon died. Fruit was in a relationship with Brandi Green, having abandoned yet another marriage. Trayvon Martin had been kicked out of his mother’s place during the previous December. He was staying with a relative when he was kicked out of Michael Kropp high school. $ybrina had no control over the actions of Traydemark at the time of his death. She had given up her parental rights when Traydemark was a toddler and his father had abandoned $ybrina to go live with Alicia Stanley.
Aussie: I’m aware of both sets of circumstances. I don’t care whether parents are together or not, it doesn’t change their responsibility to properly parent their children.
well it does make a difference if they live far apart.
I think that there is a compromise to what you are saying and that is, the parent responsible is the one living with the child.
In Hannah Anderson’s case that was the mother. The fact that she was murdred by DiMaggio might show that Mrs Anderson was concerned about her daughter’s behaviour.
In regard to Traydemark, I would suggest that initially responsibility fell to Fruit because he was in charge of the little horror. $ybrina also bears some responsibility for the fact that she did not want anything to do with her son!!
Go back to stormfront you racial bigot.
I think that there is a big difference between the two cases. It is about the level of personal relationship.
DiMaggio was known to Hannah Anderson and her family. I should not be surprised to learn that Trayvonites are not interested in the case.
Personally, I followed the headlines and did not look much further because there must have been a bit of a red flag flying. Hannah’s mother and brother were murdered and then Hannah was in the company of Di Maggio.
This leaves open a lot of questions regarding the relationship between DiMaggio and Hannah Anderson prior to the death of her mother and brother, as well as her own disappearance.
Something that stands out is that she did not seem to have made any effort to alert people that she had been kidnapped.
Hannah Anderson was not stalked by DiMaggio or at least that is how I have been reading the situation.
On saying this, I remind you that appearances can be very deceptive. Our perceptions can be deceptive in similar situations where the perpetrator is not a stranger. I have not been shy when it comes to mentioning the kidnap, rape and murder of my cousin who died before she reached the age of 21. I have spoken about the circumstances because the perpetrator was a boarder in the house where my cousin, husband and daughter were living. At the time my mother was minding my younger cousin. The family never mentioned the threats that had been made. They kept that secret from us. I can vaguely remember meeting “Doug” who was the perpetrator. My own part of the family never suspected that anything was wrong.
DiMaggio had an unstable history. His father did exactly the same thing and died in similar cirucmstances. It is a very odd situation. What stands out though, is that Hannah Anderson’s mother did not seem to suspect that DiMaggio was having a relationship with her daughter. Perhaps when she found out and she confronted DiMaggio that is when she was murdered.
So, from my POV there is no similarity between the two cases.
Is there more to the Dimaggio story?
Read more: http://www.abc15.com/dpp/news/national/james-dimaggio-family-requests-dna-samples-for-hannah-anderson-her-brother#ixzz2ccC7nUjz
I think the brother looked more like DiMaggio than his father.
Oh there’s more to the story alright but apparently the Sheriff is determined to keep Hannah a victim so I guess there’s no need to investigate anything now that the “villain” is dead and the girl rescued.
subscribed