What do JonBenet Ramsey, Madeleine McCann, Elizabeth Smart and Polly Klaas all have in common?

Media Bias: Only White Kids Get Abducted
Monday, October 20, 2008

Thousands of kids go missing each day -- so why do we never seem to hear about the African-American children?



What do JonBenet Ramsey, Madeleine McCann, Elizabeth Smart and Polly Klaas all have in common? They are all girls who have been abducted -- or in the most tragic cases, killed -- and they are all attractive white girls. Strikingly, the other similarity is all of their stories got massive play in the media during darkest days of their disappearance.

The media has always seemed to only be interested in covering stories of white children who go missing -- and pretty ones at that. Currently, Caylee Anthony fits that profile: doe-eyed with a winning smile. Despite ourselves when we first heard her story many of us thought, "Oh it's so sad, she's such a pretty little girl."

But pretty and white are not the only children in peril, and are not the only ones who should have our attention. Nearly 800,000 children under the age of 18 are reported missing each year in the United States, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Of those reported missing, 33% are African-American. So where's the 24/7 coverage of their stories?

Websites like Missing And Exploited Children and The Child Connection have much more racially integrated roster of missing children reflecting the true statistics. Unfortunately, websites do not have the immense reach of CNN and Fox news.

"Of the hundreds of thousand children that go missing each year, probably four or five get significant national media attention," Ernie Allen, President of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children tells momlogic. "It's just another missing kid to the them unless the cases are dramatic and sensational."

And there's another startling factor: "In many, many cities going back 50, 75 years or more, journalists would refer to 'good murders' and 'bad murders,'" explains, Roy Peter Clark, Vice president of the Poynter Institute for Media Studies in St. Petersburg, Florida.

"Good murders" -- murders that make good press -- are usually white girls from middle class families. "The example of a bad murder would be the murder of an African-American person from a poor neighborhood," says Clark.

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One website is doing its part to at least try to fix the disparity. Black and Missing But Not Forgotten is dedicated to spreading awareness of missing African-American children. One post on the site "Caylee Anthony is Not the Only Missing Florida Toddler, " tells the story of little Zenyetta Ra, who is also missing from the Tampa area, about 84 miles from the last known sighting of Caylee. "Zenyetta Ra is also missing", says the site, "However, you won't see Nancy Grace talking about her. Not even the local news."

The website further exemplifies the bias by this statistic. A Google search on Caylee will garner about 600,000 results. "Can't say the same for Zenyetta," laments the website.

http://www.momlogic.com/2008/10/casey_anthony_caylee_anthony_g_1.php

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Well i have to be honest i ado agree with a lot of what this says. I have said before that a children should get media coverage on not the selected few.Im aware Kate and Gerry have done a lot to keep Madeleine's plight in the public eye,but i have to be honest so have other parents.But the media seems only interested for a short time....then faded away from them..leave them alone imo.

Thing is ...not one of those four children above are any more special or important than any other child out there.Not one of them.
All children are equally important and wanted.None of them are expendable.None of them should be treated as if they are expendable either.

What you say is very true, and very sad. The press only see these cases as ways to sell copies, and so only pick the most photogenic kids in order to sell editions. But I agree that ALL children are priceless. We all know about Madeleine because of the relentless press coverage in the beginning. But I know for sure that, deep down, we all care for any abducted child, be they black, brown, yellow or white. African, Indian, Chinese. Every lost child is some families tragedy, and all parents grief is similarly unbearable. This is why I support Forever Searching. They make no destinction, and want ALL missing kids to have the same high profile.