A friend of mine, who is a youth worker, said that the sensationalist reporting of ‘Happy Slapping’ incidents had only made the situation much worse, as the ‘craze’ was so well publicised. He reckons, if the media had ignored it, then most kids would never have learned about it, and wanted to copy.
Recently, the horrific and tragic death of that poor little baby, ‘P’, led to people losing their jobs. Rightly or wrongly, the media hysteria has meant that everyone knows the identity of those workers in Harringey Social Services, who were involved in the case. I would hazard a guess that hose people have been subject to public hate, abuse and possible attacks. Certainly, their subsequent efforts to find work will have been severely compromised.
Yes, people were guilty of serious mistakes. yes, they should have done things differently.
But, they were not the people responsible for that poor little innocent child’s sickening murder. Those evil scum have thankfully been locked away, hopefully for ever.
Indeed, many who have committed murder, are afforded anonymity, on their release from sentence. and whilst i agree that people should face the consequences of their incompetency, the media response and ensuing ‘witch-hunt’ has been totally disproportionate. Yes, they deserved to lose their jobs,and be made to reflect on their own failings, but is making them a figure of public hate, and possibly the effect on their families and friends, really going to resolve anything? No. Just makes things even worse, imo. Discipline them, move them on, let them get on with their lives. I’m sure they have suffered enough, just with the knowledge of their own mistakes. They have to live with that, for the rest of their lives. To seek to ‘punish’ them further, via public humiliation, is just morally wrong, imo.
