XPost: ucb.math, alt.society.civil-liberty, ca.environment
XPost: alt.mountain-bike
Imagine a bunch of people who don't know one another trying to
solve a murder committed in a town none of them has visited.
That appears to be what's happening in the case of Jessica
Chambers, a 19-year-old girl burned to death in Panola County,
Mississippi, in December. Police haven't arrested anybody. They
haven't named any suspects.
And into that void has flowed the Internet. People from all
over consider themselves working on this case, but as a recent
story from Buzzfeed.com reveals, what these amateur Internet
sleuths seem to be doing most reliably is destroying the
reputations of the people who live in Courtland, Miss.,
population 512.
This is how Buzzfeed describes the people trying to solve the
murder.
"These people — who range from C-list conservative bloggers to
gluten-free bakers from Montreal, boat enthusiasts from Florida,
and grocery-coupon collectors from North Carolina — claim to
want #JusticeForJessica above all. Instead, they've terrorized
her formerly sleepy hometown with their relentless demands for
answers to their specious theories. In the process, they've
spread rumors that have filtered into real life, igniting racial
tensions, digging up old skeletons, and reawakening feuds. For
these amateur detectives, Jessica's death isn't a mother's
tragedy. It's a pastime."
One of my journalism friends said the excerpt above shows the
"art of the nut graf," that is that portion of a news story that
isn't the lead but best summarizes what the story is about. But
it's not just the nut graf that works. The whole story does.
It's a remarkable piece of journalism, blending, as it does, a
story that everybody would want to read about with great writing
and great journalism.
You can read the whole piece here: "Who set Jessica Chambers on
fire? The internet is trying to find out."
It's a long read, but if you're anything like me, you won't be
able to pull yourself away from it.
The piece, I believe shows what's best and what's worst about
the Internet. The Internet can bring us journalism as great as
this and uninformed, meddlesome folks who don't know nearly
enough about their topics to be writing about it.
http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2015/06/jessica_chambers_fie
ry_death.html
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