It’s been almost a year since the November homicides that shook the University of Idaho, Moscow and the rest of the nation. A quadruple homicide was manipulated into entertainment for the world. Tragedy and trauma turned into true crime fascination. Real families’ lives turned into quick entertainment.
With the rise of true crime podcasts, documentaries and TikTok’s, the horror that occurred on Nov. 13 suddenly seemed less horrific. Journalists started posting without little to no sourcing. The next big scoop was all they saw on the horizon. Ethical journalism walked out the back door, and, in some ways, we are still waiting for it to walk back onto the scene.
Media found that this story garnered the attention of millions. Fascination with tragedy moved the media to farm for whatever content they could get. In an interview with the Argonaut, journalist Lauren Paterson of Northwest Public Broadcasting said four factors move people to become obsessed with crime – young, vibrant and attractive victims, availability of photos of the victims, the rarity of stabbing crimes and the lack of a suspect. With these four factors at play in the early months following the November homicides, the story was immediately sensationalized.
That should never be the case. As journalists, no matter the story, we do not work to sensationalize. Our hearts need to be at the center of the story. Empathy should be evident in every piece we write. It should never be our priority to get the most clicks, to farm the most content without actually finding out more information.
This tragedy is just that, a tragedy. It is not the newest and most interesting story for someone’s viral TikTok. Real families lost their children.
Stacy Chapin recalled her time at CrimeCon this year during an interview with the Argonaut. She saw a room packed to the brim, about 3,000 people, all waiting to learn something new about the Moscow homicides. These people didn’t know the victims. They had no attachment to the story, but their fascination couldn’t have been higher.
Chapin said the speaker pronounced Xana Kernodles’ name incorrectly. He said there was a forest between Sigma Chi and the King Road House. Could your fascination at least be followed up with accuracy, Chapin asked. She couldn’t take the lies coming from the couch detectives, as Chapin calls them.
She walked up to the Q&A microphone and waited her turn. She reached the microphone and said “My name is Stacy Chapin and I am Ethan Chapin’s mom.”
The room fell silent. You could hear a pin drop. Suddenly people had an attachment to the story. They had a connection. The story was real. They could see the face of the mother who lost her son in tragedy.
It shouldn’t take that experience to make the story real. Our fascination should never overtake our empathy. This isn’t just some story. This isn’t just our entertainment. This is life and loss of real families. It is our job to keep that at the center of every story we write.
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Deborah Dane
Bravo!