How a “newspaper” went from felony to cruelty
To be honest the cruelty of News of the World’s behavior is hard to describe. Not to mention the pain the family of Milly Dowler had and has to go through.
Scotland Yard is now investigating evidence that the paper hacked directly into the voicemail of the missing girl’s own phone. As her friends and parents called and left messages imploring Milly to get in touch with them, the News of the World was listening and recording their every private word.
A felony which apparently was Standard Operating Procedure of the paper, as they currently face multiple legal actions for hacking and intercepting a number of phones. Once you’re past that line, your ability to distinguish right from wrong seems to shut down completely:
Milly’s voicemail box filled up and would accept no more messages. Apparently thirsty for more information from more voicemails, the News of the World intervened – and deleted the messages that had been left in the first few days after her disappearance.
When I read this, my chaw dropped. Calling this inexcusable might be the understatement of the year. Not only did that point the police into the wrong direction and destroyed evidence (next two felonies — they were on a roll apparently), it gave false hope to the family and prolonged the pain.
Go ahead, read the full article. It is a perfect example of how a media outlet completely forgot that freedom of journalism comes with a huge responsibility — just to sell a few more papers. But as much as we might be disgusted with that behavior, I think that our society’s lust for sensational stories and gossip-as-news plays a hugh part in this game. Basically everyone who ever bought this or similar papers throughout the world is an accessory.
