Trivializing the reality of violent crimes
JEERS TO The Philippine Star for publishing on its front page the scantily clad photo of a transgender woman to accompany a story on her killing.
On October 15, a photo of Filipino transgender Jennifer Laude in a bikini appeared on the Star’s front page. The photo, however, had nothing to do with the report, which was on the government’s seeking custody of the United States Marine tagged in Laude’s killing, his identification, the filing of murder charges against the suspect, and the call for justice by various groups and sectors.
Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN) secretary general Renato M. Reyes, Jr. asked the Center for Media Freedom & Responsibility (CMFR) via the social media platform Twitter:
CMFR’s response: The publication of such photographs diverts people’s attention from the fact that a crime had been committed, to the titillation of the mass audience. The same thing often happens in the reporting of rape, which is an act of violence. By providing the salacious details of the crime as well as provocative photographs similar to what the Star published, the focus shifts to the “victim,” which tends to imply that “she was asking for it.”
Irrelevant and inappropriate
maybe she was asking for it? who goes to a motel just 10min after meeting a guy?
I am at a loss why some people, you being a classic example, can be so insensitive as to lose all sense of decency and common sense. What was she asking for? Sex? To be murdered? I cannot, for the life of me, understand why people like you could find justification for the killing of someone who is not the typical macho male or the dumb and helpless female.
Are you trying to tell me that if someone wants to have sex with a guy after meeting him for 10 minutes you have bought a one-way ticket to hell? What if we take things to the extreme and say that people who are insensitive and who posts a statement “who goes to a motel just 10 minutes after meeting a guy?” should be killed on sight?
I sincerely hope and pray that this foul thing would not befall you or any member of your family. If it happens to you or any member of your family, a sister perhaps, be assured that I will not, like you, post an inane and insensitive comment that robs people of their humanity and dignity. I pray to Buddha, Yahweh, Allah, Krishna and to all the other supreme beings to visit you and strike you, not with lightning, but with enlightenment. And may they do so with the rest of this nation, more so with our President who, like you, can sleep soundly even though one of us, a Filipino, was brutally murdered.