Some pretty intense sentiments have appeared in the comments on our coverage of the disappearance and murder of Autumn Pasquale on Patch.
Without calling out individual commenters, I've seen posts advocating for an (explicitly) savage assault of the two juveniles charged with the crime; remarks saying that anyone who caught up with them would be well-served to kill them outright and cover it up; even some that suggested that Pasquale's killers should be made to suffer in a public forum.
It was enough to make me want to ask Patch readers as an audience—where are we with this?
Without dismissing the severity of the tragedy that has unfolded this week in the small town of Clayton, we’ve pretty much seen some of the worst in ourselves as it’s played out.
Before Gloucester County Prosecutor Sean Dalton held a press conference Tuesday to announce that arrests had been made in the case, we already had our outrage prepared.
(How ready were we? One media outlet led with a headline announcing that the suspects had "murdered" Pasquale—before remembering that journalists don’t have the power to convict people and attributing the remark to Dalton.)
At that press conference, Dalton did not provide the names of the 15- and 17-year-old who were charged in the case.
But the Internet did.
We saw it happen first on Facebook and Twitter, and then, shrugging their shoulders and looking at one another, on local and international press outlets, who repeated it louder and louder.
This is a real problem for new media. In the world where everyone has an online presence and is therefore a real-time source of information, what is the value of a thing like legal precedent? Or professional ethics?
When you’re being deafened by a crowd-sourced outing, what’s the sense of keeping quiet?
If that were the biggest problem I see in this case, I would take it. But the level of anger, fantasy violence and maudlin emotion about this story is what’s really shocking—and that's before we even get to how it's being broadcast with a sense that we are entitled to these feelings, collectively.
This is a traumatic and deeply saddening crime. But who has a right to that level of grief? The families involved in the case—both of them. And that’s about it. Not me, not you, not other parents, not vigilantes.
Collingswood was floored this summer to learn of the violent death of 21-year-old Shelley Johnson of the Tortilla Press. All the way out in Vacaville, C.A., the family of her boyfriend, Paul Aldapa,
This is what’s also true of the family of the two juvenile suspects charged in Autumn Pasquale’s death.
If they are convicted of those crimes, they will be known rightly and lawfully as murderers. And that pronouncement will not give any of the children involved in this case back to their parents.
So what are we on the sideline doing screaming for vengeance? What are we owed from this?
- We can deserve a safe community without needing to abandon the reason that should uphold it.
- We can be good parents and loving neighbors without demanding that we beat our breasts and weep and say that tragedies like these form a legitimate basis for revenge.
- We might even wait to see how the trial goes before we choose to react. Being good parents, and knowing that our children will measure their emotional investment by our own, it’s an opportunity to show kids that there is a process at work here.
- Just because we’re as scared that something awful lurks around the corners of our own neighborhoods does not obligate us to lash out blindly. Nor does it excuse the self-righteousness of our anger.
John Donne said it more artfully than you’ll get from me. But if we all are "of mankind," then we owe it to ourselves to get better at sticking together.
So, before we climb up on the high horse, let's be sure to look in that mirror. The backside of the horse often looks better than we do in perspective.
What I'm noticing is the very serious emotional reaction to things that people don't have a primary personal connection to. My concern, or observation, or whatever, is that we are using some of these things to work out other "stuff" in our own lives. And if we're not, if we really are just angry and violent most of the time and this is just an expression of what lies beneath the surface, then I'm even more concerned. You don't even need to use this particular story as an example, per se. Just take a look at some of the comments that have flooded our streams during the debate season. Some of the remarks made about candidates and their supporters are no less ham-fistedly expressed, but we seem to tolerate these because it's political discourse and we figure nobody knows what they're talking about anyway. With the case above, I see something a lot different.
To rise up and surmount this overwhelming sense of destruction and death is a global effort. We have to erase it from the human psyche. It is natural to want to kill- as much as I hate to say it. Don't believe me? Look to our closest ancestors: A troop of chimpanzees will viciously massacre another. What survival purposes does this fulfill? None. It's purely social, and more or less, totally meaningless to the continuation of life. To say that it is odd for one to become this mad at something like this- to me- seems rather absurd. Even though there may be no direct or personal connection, we can easily become unsettled over stories that do not concern us. You cannot stop murders like this. So, I feel it's safe to say that I can't stop my thirst for justice, one a prison sentencing can not satisfy. They should feel the pain they caused.
You bring up movies and popular media as a place where we talk about these things, and I remember them as well. Miyagi told Daniel "man who seeks revenge starts by digging two graves." Gandalf told Frodo "do not be quick to deal out death in judgment; for many that die deserve to live, and many live that yet deserve to die." I don't disagree that this is an affecting and sad and horrible case to follow. What I do think is that we need to recognize that we don't fix tragedy by bringing more tragedy upon ourselves. But thanks also for your thoughtful reply.
Like you, I was hopeful; like you, I share your extreme disappointment in its outcome. That still doesn't excuse the severity of these reactions. I don't understand why just because something tragic happened that we should inflict or wish for further violence as compensation. Who does that help? How much do we feel better? If the people who did this are convicted, they will be punished. Eviscerating and excoriating them, even if they were indeed guilty, does nothing to bring the victim back, nothing to keep our kids safer; the people suspected in the crime are in custody. We can certainly fear for the safety of our children and seek justice for unjust acts, but in the wisdom of our forebears, we put processes in place for handling these things. We ought to respect them. It's the level of anger, the quickness with which we access it, and the degree to which we are convinced that it is justified that concern me. I see it too many places besides here for it to be coincidental. If we're not able to learn about unfortunate events without processing them in a healthy fashion, I fear more for our collective future than I do any random criminals.