#ipv cw

The 411 - Between the Sheets (Sony Music UK, 2004) Found In: Sue Ryder (Eastleigh) Price: £1

Ah, the 411 - picking up where All Saints left off in the American-passing-British R&B four-girl group stakes. In sound, at least.

Brutal and shocking and absolutely horrific in every way, this crime understandably causes everyone who learns about it to have an instant reaction. How can it not?

Yet according to just about every social media post I have seen, it is an open and shut case of stalking, while the newspaper articles tell a very different story.

For example, here are two excerpts from The New York Time’s article on the murder:

...

Which is to say, this doesn’t seem to be a case of stalking.

This seems to be a case of two young people who got together in a manner that is not unusual (met online and then moved things offline), had met each other’s families, and were going out together when one decided to enact brutal and horrific violence.

It can be so tempting to corden this kind of violence off into a narrative of stranger danger, of stalking and extreme reactions to rejection. It is so much harder to acknowledge that such an act of violence can come from a friend or family member or intimate partner. But it can.

That can be hard to confront, especially when it comes to brutal crimes like this murder and attempted suicide. But it is distressing how quickly and easily I see everyone on my dash buy into the idea that Mr. Clark was a stalker, when the articles I have been reading seem to paint a different picture.

Intimate partner violence, dating violence, domestic violence, whatever terminology you wish to use... it is a horrible thing, and often hard to reckon with. The idea that you can trust a person, let them into your life, only for them to harm you, even kill you... well I could go on at length about the difficulties and aversions we have as a society to truly confronting that reality. The many shaming ways society tries to frame this form of violence. But this isn’t just about that.

It is about misinformation, and confirmation bias, and how assumptions can snowball into statements of fact. 

You should regularly be asking yourself questions about your media sources. Questions like:

Where are you getting your information from? 

What standards are they held to? 

Do you trust them to be an accurate news source, and why? 

Is this a primary source, someone reporting directly from the event or on their own experience and reaction? If not, what sort of processes do they have to ensure the accuracy of what they are reporting? 

How sourced are their claims? 

What causes you to trust them over other perspectives? 

How many different perspectives have you consumed (i.e. how many articles on this topic did you read and from how many different news sources)? 

It is very very healthy to ask yourself these questions, and ask them regularly. 

You shouldn’t just be reading headlines and blurbs and twitter threads and letting that take up the bulk of your news consumption. 

Yes, being actively engaged is a very taxing emotional burden at the moment, but that means the stakes of being accurately informed are more vital than ever. We live in an age where misinformation is everywhere, and it is designed to appeal to you. To me as well. I am not saying this because I am magically above it all. The questions I typed above are ones I need to ask myself as well.

Send me a “ 🔥 “ for an unpopular opinion

this is gonna be a real heavy one so i'll stick it under a readmore bc if anything loses me followers itll be this, but since this is under an anon and i'm feeling fired up... might as well bc this is genuinely smth that really REALLY gets under my skin