The Casey Anthony Media Circus

Headline News pretty much became the Casey Anthony channel throughout the trial. The resulting coverage created a media circus and all but made a joke out of the court system and jury system. Frankly it was one of the most revolting things I have seen. The story was milked by HLN and anyone else associated with reporting it for profit and ratings. Nancy Grace jumped into the midst of this circus and essentially degraded herself, tot mom was spewed so much out of her mouth it became a stream of verbal liquid puke. The sad part so many got sucked into this tent of drama, junk journalism and emotional swill.

Caylee, Casey Anthony and all of the other players in this sad show provided profiteers and morbid minded people with the ability to sit and absorb themselves in a wall to wall orgy of coverage complete with dramatic music played on cue and scenes in and out of court played over and over and over again. This was not journalism, this was reality TV running wild in the guise of reporting an event.

The interesting thing to note here is that indeed this story needed to be told and the trial needed to be followed. It was news that needed to be reported. But, what happened? Why did this story become a reality TV show? The answer lies with the audience. Studies have proven that many people are drawn to tragic events. People drive slower past an accident scene, gather in groups to gawk at police after they arrive on a crime scene. People stare at fires being fought and many people will watch people being loaded into an ambulance with intense curiosity. It is not until they become the show that they realize this is kind of twisted. I understand the curiosity and even concern from some people but, I do find it disturbing that some would look on with the idea of the event being some sort of entertainment. There is nothing entertaining about any of this.

Beyond that I think that a lot of people took in the trial of Casey Anthony with the feeling of well at least I am better then she is. Then there are those whose minds are so warped, well you get where I am going with this point. What I am getting at here is that people sought to be entertained or to play judge, jury and in some cases executioner via this story. While others reveled in the death of a child. Normal interest in a tragic story was lost in a sick TV reality show that the media created by design to garner audience and it did so quite effectively. And probably helped create a tidy profit of the HLN owners.

So many people want justice for Caylee and punishment for Casey Anthony that they have become blinded by an unrealistic view of what the justice system is supposed to do. The reality that what the jury was tasked with was not justice but, to determine if fault rested with Casey Anthony is what the justice system is intended for and what the jury was asked to do and that is what they did. The job is to determine guilt and apply an appropriate punishment if the person is found guilty. In the end they could find no evidence to support the assertion that she committed the crime. Is Casey Anthony culpable, absolutely, she did not report her child's death and lied about it and by the way so did her family. Casey Antony even went so far as to create a fictitious person gave them a name and in so doing wrecked a real persons life and for that she should be held to account but, that is another story and probably another trial away.

Now having said all of that lets get back to the topic at hand which is or was the intense media coverage. It was so deep and wide that it created factions, those supporting Casey, those opposed to her. It created headaches for the trial judge and the jury. The media coverage also made it almost impossible to come up with a verdict other than guilty, in effect usurping the justice system and lastly the coverage nearly got to the point of inciting a couple or riots and vigilante justice. In short it went way to far and was so biased, which breaks every rule of media ethics. which encourages and even demands unbiased reporting and fair coverage of both sides of the story. HLN and many other media players failed miserably to do that and instead opted to go with the reality TV mentality. A great way to make money but a poor way to do the news.

The best way to honor the memory of Caylee Anthony is to ignore Casey Anthony, to keep the media attention away from her and to if anything just keep any follow up simple and straight forward. The more attention Casey gets the more she will do to play to the media. That is a fact that came out in the trial.

I did not want to comment on this story because I did not want Casey Anthony to get more press but, seeing how badly the media acted on this file I could not help but to offer an opinion on what I saw and what I saw was disgusting. I understand the need to get an audience and to drive revenues that is what the news media is supposed to do, it is also supposed to report the news in a manner that is unbiased, respectful to both sides in the story and should not deliberately polarize the public. On all of the afore mentioned HLN and others covering the Casey Anthony trial failed spectacularly by opting to create what was nothing more than reality TV in the guise of a news story. A true media circus.

Cliff T.