Story in the headline

Some headlines give away the entire story just by existing. For instance, Perfectionist Who Felt Ugly Hanged Herself. For a newspaper to put such a headline on a story about a perfectionist who really was ugly would violate one of the laws of news, which is not to offend against sentimentality. Since the suicide was a woman, you also know she will be young and pretty, because it another law of news is that, apart from a rare murderess, only young, pretty women are news; the rest are statistics.

So never mind that by far the more common cases, in order, are a sad, ugly middle-aged man whose perfectionism, depression, and loneliness culminate in suicide, the same in a young man, and a distant third, the same in a young woman. Well, ugly is too much--more accurately average-to-homely, as most of us are, after all. None of those stories is news: no one wants to be reminded of so much bleak sadness or see the pictures. This young woman's story yields the warmly sentimental form of sadness now denominated "tragedy" and vocalized tsk-tsk and "Oh poor girl!" There is also the primal satisfaction of looking at a pretty young woman, enjoyed by both sexes and all ages.

This is also why 99% of nationally reported kidnappings of adults are of good looking young women. I have seen people put it down to racism, since the skew is similarly white, but if it is racism it is a very oblique kind resulting from the ludicrous value present day America puts on blonde hair. (Razib has demonstrated that in the early to mid 20th century, when America was much more racist, brunettes were favored, so blonde favoritism is not simply related to racism.)

Reporters are a pretty disgusting crew. Kind of a pity they are now our moral, political, and cultural arbiters.