I started role playing 40 years ago. Innocently slaughtering goblins for years before I realized I was in the thrall of the devil. I would never have realized I was doing the devil's handiwork had I not attended a game at a public library in Tauranga (just down the road from Bethlehem College). There were protestors, actual adults, mostly middle aged women, and cardigan wearing men with scrupulously groomed beards, telling me I was dooming their children, who given the ages of those protesting must have been old enough to have voted, at least twice, to a fiery damnation. I didn’t know their children and I was pretty sure my 4th level dwarf fighter, drinking himself into oblivion in a corner of tavern while picking fights with passing elves wasn’t doing harm to anything (or anybody) other than his imaginary liver. So I walked past the local representatives of the religious extremities and proceeded to have a jolly good time. But that wasn’t the end of it. There were letters to the editor, complaints to the council, there were even threats of violence. Did any of this bring me closer to the devil? I can’t say. I dabbled briefly in a pentecostal church when I was younger (there was a girl…) and I might have glimpsed old toby there, but I can honestly say I never met him in a gaming session. I did however meet dozens of fascinating creative people who helped me build stories from the raw materials of imagination, every Friday at 6pm (bring your own snack of choice). I also met my best friend in that library. A friendship I’ve cherished for 35 years. So satanic panic be damned. I’m going to sit in a tavern in rusty armour, drink to Peter Ellis, and pick a fight with an elf.
I cried when the news came out last Friday. Finally. This case has distressed me since I was at intermediate school. Even to a 12 year old at Catholic School the whole thing seemed ludicrous.
I feel for the kids that were at the heart of this who were so failed by their parents and the other adults around them. What a burden to carry.
So glad you have shared this and connected all those dots. Its so important we understand the outcomes that come from allowing hysteria to over take logic.
Its sad to think how many men have been deterred from teaching and working with children in NZ over the last 30 years based on a fear of this craziness being able to happen.
On Tuesday I did a good long interview with NBC about Furry Panic in school, and called it another moral panic like the Satanic one. I love how you feature this as an exciting fake story vs boring truth.
The Furry Panic is naming supposed cat boxes put in school bathrooms for students who "identify as animals", which never happened. A Colorado Republican governor candidate repeated it and took it from a right-wing parents pressure group on Facebook. She is a member and the group is meant to grab power in schools, while fearmongering about LGBT people.
The boring truth is there ARE schools that have lockdown preparations for shooter incidents, including a bucket with kitty litter stashed in a closet in case they are locked down for a long time.
One of those schools is Columbine. Think of the implications of that. And right wingers say they are for freedom.
So incredibly sad that Mr Ellis spent 7 years in prison. Whenever I read of stories like this I feel frustrated and angered by how much religion dictates so much destruction and ignorance on people's lives, in so many different ways! It's hard not to feel utter contempt for all the varying religions out there.
Can't help but think witches would have been far more likeable than a lot of the catholic priests I've read about, or the extreme evangelicals condemning anyone that does not conform to their absurd narrow mindedness.
Terribly sad for Mr Ellis, his family, and the children that had to grow up with the guilt and anger of knowing they had been used and manipulated to aid in the lies that targeted this man. And it infuriates me how often homosexuality gets thrown into the same group as devil worship by these fuckwits. What in the actual fuck...
The thing I find most terrifying about all this is that someone can watch something like Hocus Fucking Pocus 2 and find it powerful enough to inspire their easily influenced mind to do anything other than switch it off.
Another dimension to this case that has always bothered the hell out of me is WHY and HOW people could believe this without a shred of physical evidence. And yet even today sexual assaults have the lowest conviction rate by a substantial margin. We knew kids around that time who were actually abused. Just the ‘boring’ abuse that does routinely happen. Their abuser’s actions were excused and the community rallied around him. Silencing and gaslighting the young victims. Many years later, he was convicted on historic crimes. The adults in disbelieving those young victims had enabled him to continue.
I’ll admit -- I like spooky things. I’ve found life to be more fun when you engage with the weird, silly side. I (try to) to ghosts with Ouija Boards, I have tarot cards, I collect pretty rocks that someone told me could increase my confidence, and I’m an ambassador for an organization called Liminal Earth that’s curating map of submitted weird experiences.
The unexplained is fun. And as an ex-Catholic getting over a lot of religious trauma, I’ve found it easier to replace my once very rigid belief system with one that’s basically got no rules. Is bigfoot out there? I dunno! Can we call him? Let’s try it, I guess! There’s no harm in that.
There is, however, a lot of harm embedded within our culture (America’s, anyway). To me, it feels like it’s always stemmed from religion and spread outwards from there? I once went on a date with a guy who’d very nearly been an ordained priest, who told me that he once assisted on an exorcism of a wall that they’d determined was possessed because ... it was crying, apparently? When I asked why a demon would possess a wall in the first place, he said ‘because it would make a good story’. Because he’d told me the story, so maybe I’d believe, and tell others, who’d tell others, who’d be more susceptible to possession because they believed. The supernatural reality TV shows Discovery pushes always, always blame things on demons -- and people watch those, and believe them. It stops people from seeking the therapy the need, the medication and care they need because they feel like they have Demons, not medical problems. The damage caused at the end of the day is incalculable.
You’d have hoped that that shit, at the end of the day, would have been left in the 90s. But it feels like it’s just been on a boiler plate for decades, waiting to bubble over again. And it feels like it’s definitely going to. Maybe it won’t look exactly the same, but the rise in fascism, the pushback against trans individuals, the anti-vax fear mongering -- we’re primed and ready to burn anyone we feel is an ‘other’ at the stake again. At least that’s what it feels like to me.
this is so fascinating! have you listened to the podcast “You’re Wrong About?” one of their early episodes is on the satanic panic, and one of the co-hosts is an expert on the topic. there are also lots of other episodes that cover things you’ve mentioned before (Dyaltov Pass for example). its so fun to find connections like these!
Tragic story, I sold a lot of copies of A City Possessed over the years.
One of the most interesting things about the ruling for me is how usually him dying would be the end of it, but the court recognised tikanga and restoring mana - it’s going to set a huge precedent in the future I think - and it’s an incredible moment for Māoridom - he was pakeha but Māori customs were still considered in his case. Incredible.
If anyone wants another great piece of writing about Satanic panic I highly recommend Damien Echols’ book. He was one of the west Memphis three, and if you’re not familiar you’re in for one hell of a ride.
Moral panics claim so many innocent victims. I grew up in Christchurch and was always sceptical of the whole Satanic Abuse panic. The claims against Peter Ellis were always so far fetched that it should never have gone to court. But moral panics are never about rational evaluation of the evidence. Peter, working in early childhood education, was an easy and obvious target for this conspiracy theory gone wild. Tragically he never lived to see his name cleared. While justice has finally been done, it is justice delayed.
Reading this, I am also reminded of my own story of being a victim of moral panic in the doomsday cult I grew up in. About a year after my twin brother's death whom I had attempted unsuccessfully to resuscitate, I developed non-epileptic seizures which worsened over time. While no physical reason could be found I believe that it was what is called a Conversion Disorder or Functional Neurological Disorder. These disorders tend to be triggered by trauma or extreme stress and can manifest with paralysis or non epileptic seizure.
A deacon in the cult and his wife, however, concluded that I was demon possessed and informed the local minister of their conclusion. The said minister then applied an exorcism on me to get rid of the supposed demon that had taken me over. Then after discussion with the regional director who looked after all the congregations of the cult in NZ and the pacific Islands it was decided to use my story to warn everyone of the dangers of the demonic realm and the occult, even though had never done anything related to the occult, not even D&D. But why let the facts get in the way of a good moral panic. So my experience was told and distorted around the country. But the local minister, one Colin Sutcliffe was particularly vicious in his telling, in what I have come to see was a masterclass in psychological destruction.
It was an experience that left psychologically damaged for years. With the help of a good therapist I have come to see this experience for what it was. I was a pawn to be used by those in power to increase their power and influence. From all the moral panics I've read about, big and small, this seems to be a similar dynamic. The victims are the weak, the disempowered, those who are non conformists. It may be women, ethnic minorities, the LBGTQI+ rainbow community, the poor etc. They all at some stage have been targets of moral panics in order to reinforce the power of the elite over those whom they consider to be the other.
A friend of mine was convicted of paedophilia in Canada in the mid 90s. The children (now adults) were all subjected to "recovered memory therapy" and he was accused and sent to trial. If you had ever met him once, you would know that the charges were nonsense. However, his lawyer told him to plead guilty. "They are going to convict you, anyway. If you plead not guilty, you may get 25 years; plead guilty and it will 'only' be three.". And that's what he got. He died a year ago. I think he was the most truly civilised man I have ever known.
After he had done his time and supposedly paid his dues, he could no longer travel. Countries refused to let him enter because he was a "paedophile". All these bloody Christians who constantly forget "and the greatest of these is Charity".
“The best stories always win. Doesn’t matter if they’re true or not.”
It’s hard for me to wrap my mind around how a person can ruin someone’s life over rumors they heard that have no truth to them. How someone’s life and reputation can be totally destroyed over things people said that aren’t even true. I’ll take the boring truth any day over wild lies that ruin lives.
Educated women having careers was a big impetus of the Satanic Panic, they were supposed to be home taking care of their kids, not at a job they were proud of and worked hard to get (along with the implication that a man probably lost this job to this unqualified woman). Latchkey kids were big in the news back then, the kids who went home to empty houses and had to look after themselves until their parents got home. Those kids were supposedly ripe for the picking, not to mention the kids who were in daycare centers who were too young to know what was being "done" to them. All that panic and all that pain and there has never been a single proven case of children being hurt during a Satanic ritual. Meanwhile, actual Satanists are here making good trouble and protesting for reproductive rights and the removal of any mention of God from out government. The irony is so thick I want to put it on my hot chocolate.
The insanity of the “Holy” Spanish Inquisition & growing up surrounded by relics of torture & witch persecutions (most Austrian castles had torture chambers, most villages had some witches’ gallows in the woods somewhere) is what made me turn on my Catholic upbringing at age 10.
It was so OBVIOUSLY unjust and outrageous and concocted by the men in the Church as a tool for control & their own perversions (e.g. did you know the jailers of a virgin witch could rape her before she was burnt to “cleanse” her?)... With the “Hexenhammer” (Malleus Maleficarum) being one of the most misogynistic - and influential - texts ever written, I found it so hard to understand that so few other people around me shared my outrage. Austria remained over 90% Catholic until some massive child abuse scandals in 90s finally took the gloss off...
So I turned into a Punk rebelling this oppressive BS that surrounded me & to this day my mother incredulously asks me if I’m a Satanist every time she sees me in a skull shirt 🤦♀️ This indoctrination by the Church - despite all the evidence of past & current horrors & injustice that maimed, tortured & killed so many good lives - still goes extremely deep.
I feel so much for Peter Ellis & anyone who ever got their lives destroyed by a genuine “witch hunt”. Which is why I’m so distraught that Trumpists are turning the phrase into meaning the opposite - and one of the greatest predators & perpetrators into a Saint who is “saving the children from pedophile blood-drinking libs”. This opposite-world is an utter disgrace to the millions of souls that were harmed & forgotten by this outrageous tool of misogyny & hatred.
Eurgh! I always knew of Peter Ellis' name and that he was probably innocent but I didn't realise the REDICULOUS crimes he was supposed to have perpetrated. I could rant on for days about this but all I'm going to say is the whole satanic panic movement, like QAnon, is just another human example of SOME people WORRYING ABOUT THE WRONG THING! We have ACTUAL ISSUES that NEED YOUR ATTENTION and you're trying to SAVE CHILDREN FROM SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T EVEN EXIST.
Some ideas: climate change and it's coming challenges (that will effect EVERYONE on earth because it's the ENVIRONMENT we LIVE IN) Domestic violence and its insidious erosion of our community, crumbling infrastructure (the poop has gotta go somewhere, into the sea ain't great) our increasingly ageing population and the challenges that will come from that. There, that's 4 things that actually exist right now.
Eurrrgghhh!? Gets me angry.
I'm actually a kiwi living in Oz, back in NZ for a 2 week holiday (fly back this Saturday) and I've been chatting to friends about the state of things, as you do. I feel like most humans right now are just trying to do the best they can living their life, raising their families, working to pay their bills. Then you get these idiots screaming into the void, who we hear because they SCREAM LOUD, and then everyone starts thinking that maybe everything is f**ked... It's much easier to be apathetic if everything is f**ked? Anyway, from what I can see there are coming challenges, but nothing insurmountable if we work together as humans... Rather than listening to keyboard warriors! Gah! Face-palm.
I don't know how we teach people to be more intrigued with the mundane, and not search for entertainment in the news, or other peoples lives. Clearly, sensationalism, when paired with "othering", is incredibly common and disastrously dangerous.
Side note: I was horrified listening to the episode of Armchair Expert with Saul Kassin on False Confessions. There's clearly a massive element of that here in Ellis' case.
I started role playing 40 years ago. Innocently slaughtering goblins for years before I realized I was in the thrall of the devil. I would never have realized I was doing the devil's handiwork had I not attended a game at a public library in Tauranga (just down the road from Bethlehem College). There were protestors, actual adults, mostly middle aged women, and cardigan wearing men with scrupulously groomed beards, telling me I was dooming their children, who given the ages of those protesting must have been old enough to have voted, at least twice, to a fiery damnation. I didn’t know their children and I was pretty sure my 4th level dwarf fighter, drinking himself into oblivion in a corner of tavern while picking fights with passing elves wasn’t doing harm to anything (or anybody) other than his imaginary liver. So I walked past the local representatives of the religious extremities and proceeded to have a jolly good time. But that wasn’t the end of it. There were letters to the editor, complaints to the council, there were even threats of violence. Did any of this bring me closer to the devil? I can’t say. I dabbled briefly in a pentecostal church when I was younger (there was a girl…) and I might have glimpsed old toby there, but I can honestly say I never met him in a gaming session. I did however meet dozens of fascinating creative people who helped me build stories from the raw materials of imagination, every Friday at 6pm (bring your own snack of choice). I also met my best friend in that library. A friendship I’ve cherished for 35 years. So satanic panic be damned. I’m going to sit in a tavern in rusty armour, drink to Peter Ellis, and pick a fight with an elf.
I cried when the news came out last Friday. Finally. This case has distressed me since I was at intermediate school. Even to a 12 year old at Catholic School the whole thing seemed ludicrous.
I feel for the kids that were at the heart of this who were so failed by their parents and the other adults around them. What a burden to carry.
So glad you have shared this and connected all those dots. Its so important we understand the outcomes that come from allowing hysteria to over take logic.
Its sad to think how many men have been deterred from teaching and working with children in NZ over the last 30 years based on a fear of this craziness being able to happen.
Poor dude, but so happy for the outcome.
On Tuesday I did a good long interview with NBC about Furry Panic in school, and called it another moral panic like the Satanic one. I love how you feature this as an exciting fake story vs boring truth.
The Furry Panic is naming supposed cat boxes put in school bathrooms for students who "identify as animals", which never happened. A Colorado Republican governor candidate repeated it and took it from a right-wing parents pressure group on Facebook. She is a member and the group is meant to grab power in schools, while fearmongering about LGBT people.
The boring truth is there ARE schools that have lockdown preparations for shooter incidents, including a bucket with kitty litter stashed in a closet in case they are locked down for a long time.
One of those schools is Columbine. Think of the implications of that. And right wingers say they are for freedom.
So incredibly sad that Mr Ellis spent 7 years in prison. Whenever I read of stories like this I feel frustrated and angered by how much religion dictates so much destruction and ignorance on people's lives, in so many different ways! It's hard not to feel utter contempt for all the varying religions out there.
Can't help but think witches would have been far more likeable than a lot of the catholic priests I've read about, or the extreme evangelicals condemning anyone that does not conform to their absurd narrow mindedness.
Terribly sad for Mr Ellis, his family, and the children that had to grow up with the guilt and anger of knowing they had been used and manipulated to aid in the lies that targeted this man. And it infuriates me how often homosexuality gets thrown into the same group as devil worship by these fuckwits. What in the actual fuck...
The thing I find most terrifying about all this is that someone can watch something like Hocus Fucking Pocus 2 and find it powerful enough to inspire their easily influenced mind to do anything other than switch it off.
Another dimension to this case that has always bothered the hell out of me is WHY and HOW people could believe this without a shred of physical evidence. And yet even today sexual assaults have the lowest conviction rate by a substantial margin. We knew kids around that time who were actually abused. Just the ‘boring’ abuse that does routinely happen. Their abuser’s actions were excused and the community rallied around him. Silencing and gaslighting the young victims. Many years later, he was convicted on historic crimes. The adults in disbelieving those young victims had enabled him to continue.
I’ll admit -- I like spooky things. I’ve found life to be more fun when you engage with the weird, silly side. I (try to) to ghosts with Ouija Boards, I have tarot cards, I collect pretty rocks that someone told me could increase my confidence, and I’m an ambassador for an organization called Liminal Earth that’s curating map of submitted weird experiences.
The unexplained is fun. And as an ex-Catholic getting over a lot of religious trauma, I’ve found it easier to replace my once very rigid belief system with one that’s basically got no rules. Is bigfoot out there? I dunno! Can we call him? Let’s try it, I guess! There’s no harm in that.
There is, however, a lot of harm embedded within our culture (America’s, anyway). To me, it feels like it’s always stemmed from religion and spread outwards from there? I once went on a date with a guy who’d very nearly been an ordained priest, who told me that he once assisted on an exorcism of a wall that they’d determined was possessed because ... it was crying, apparently? When I asked why a demon would possess a wall in the first place, he said ‘because it would make a good story’. Because he’d told me the story, so maybe I’d believe, and tell others, who’d tell others, who’d be more susceptible to possession because they believed. The supernatural reality TV shows Discovery pushes always, always blame things on demons -- and people watch those, and believe them. It stops people from seeking the therapy the need, the medication and care they need because they feel like they have Demons, not medical problems. The damage caused at the end of the day is incalculable.
You’d have hoped that that shit, at the end of the day, would have been left in the 90s. But it feels like it’s just been on a boiler plate for decades, waiting to bubble over again. And it feels like it’s definitely going to. Maybe it won’t look exactly the same, but the rise in fascism, the pushback against trans individuals, the anti-vax fear mongering -- we’re primed and ready to burn anyone we feel is an ‘other’ at the stake again. At least that’s what it feels like to me.
this is so fascinating! have you listened to the podcast “You’re Wrong About?” one of their early episodes is on the satanic panic, and one of the co-hosts is an expert on the topic. there are also lots of other episodes that cover things you’ve mentioned before (Dyaltov Pass for example). its so fun to find connections like these!
Tragic story, I sold a lot of copies of A City Possessed over the years.
One of the most interesting things about the ruling for me is how usually him dying would be the end of it, but the court recognised tikanga and restoring mana - it’s going to set a huge precedent in the future I think - and it’s an incredible moment for Māoridom - he was pakeha but Māori customs were still considered in his case. Incredible.
If anyone wants another great piece of writing about Satanic panic I highly recommend Damien Echols’ book. He was one of the west Memphis three, and if you’re not familiar you’re in for one hell of a ride.
Moral panics claim so many innocent victims. I grew up in Christchurch and was always sceptical of the whole Satanic Abuse panic. The claims against Peter Ellis were always so far fetched that it should never have gone to court. But moral panics are never about rational evaluation of the evidence. Peter, working in early childhood education, was an easy and obvious target for this conspiracy theory gone wild. Tragically he never lived to see his name cleared. While justice has finally been done, it is justice delayed.
Reading this, I am also reminded of my own story of being a victim of moral panic in the doomsday cult I grew up in. About a year after my twin brother's death whom I had attempted unsuccessfully to resuscitate, I developed non-epileptic seizures which worsened over time. While no physical reason could be found I believe that it was what is called a Conversion Disorder or Functional Neurological Disorder. These disorders tend to be triggered by trauma or extreme stress and can manifest with paralysis or non epileptic seizure.
A deacon in the cult and his wife, however, concluded that I was demon possessed and informed the local minister of their conclusion. The said minister then applied an exorcism on me to get rid of the supposed demon that had taken me over. Then after discussion with the regional director who looked after all the congregations of the cult in NZ and the pacific Islands it was decided to use my story to warn everyone of the dangers of the demonic realm and the occult, even though had never done anything related to the occult, not even D&D. But why let the facts get in the way of a good moral panic. So my experience was told and distorted around the country. But the local minister, one Colin Sutcliffe was particularly vicious in his telling, in what I have come to see was a masterclass in psychological destruction.
It was an experience that left psychologically damaged for years. With the help of a good therapist I have come to see this experience for what it was. I was a pawn to be used by those in power to increase their power and influence. From all the moral panics I've read about, big and small, this seems to be a similar dynamic. The victims are the weak, the disempowered, those who are non conformists. It may be women, ethnic minorities, the LBGTQI+ rainbow community, the poor etc. They all at some stage have been targets of moral panics in order to reinforce the power of the elite over those whom they consider to be the other.
Kids don't know the difference between fantasy and reality, also we should not let them play D&D in case they get turned into Warlocks
A friend of mine was convicted of paedophilia in Canada in the mid 90s. The children (now adults) were all subjected to "recovered memory therapy" and he was accused and sent to trial. If you had ever met him once, you would know that the charges were nonsense. However, his lawyer told him to plead guilty. "They are going to convict you, anyway. If you plead not guilty, you may get 25 years; plead guilty and it will 'only' be three.". And that's what he got. He died a year ago. I think he was the most truly civilised man I have ever known.
After he had done his time and supposedly paid his dues, he could no longer travel. Countries refused to let him enter because he was a "paedophile". All these bloody Christians who constantly forget "and the greatest of these is Charity".
“The best stories always win. Doesn’t matter if they’re true or not.”
It’s hard for me to wrap my mind around how a person can ruin someone’s life over rumors they heard that have no truth to them. How someone’s life and reputation can be totally destroyed over things people said that aren’t even true. I’ll take the boring truth any day over wild lies that ruin lives.
Educated women having careers was a big impetus of the Satanic Panic, they were supposed to be home taking care of their kids, not at a job they were proud of and worked hard to get (along with the implication that a man probably lost this job to this unqualified woman). Latchkey kids were big in the news back then, the kids who went home to empty houses and had to look after themselves until their parents got home. Those kids were supposedly ripe for the picking, not to mention the kids who were in daycare centers who were too young to know what was being "done" to them. All that panic and all that pain and there has never been a single proven case of children being hurt during a Satanic ritual. Meanwhile, actual Satanists are here making good trouble and protesting for reproductive rights and the removal of any mention of God from out government. The irony is so thick I want to put it on my hot chocolate.
The insanity of the “Holy” Spanish Inquisition & growing up surrounded by relics of torture & witch persecutions (most Austrian castles had torture chambers, most villages had some witches’ gallows in the woods somewhere) is what made me turn on my Catholic upbringing at age 10.
It was so OBVIOUSLY unjust and outrageous and concocted by the men in the Church as a tool for control & their own perversions (e.g. did you know the jailers of a virgin witch could rape her before she was burnt to “cleanse” her?)... With the “Hexenhammer” (Malleus Maleficarum) being one of the most misogynistic - and influential - texts ever written, I found it so hard to understand that so few other people around me shared my outrage. Austria remained over 90% Catholic until some massive child abuse scandals in 90s finally took the gloss off...
So I turned into a Punk rebelling this oppressive BS that surrounded me & to this day my mother incredulously asks me if I’m a Satanist every time she sees me in a skull shirt 🤦♀️ This indoctrination by the Church - despite all the evidence of past & current horrors & injustice that maimed, tortured & killed so many good lives - still goes extremely deep.
I feel so much for Peter Ellis & anyone who ever got their lives destroyed by a genuine “witch hunt”. Which is why I’m so distraught that Trumpists are turning the phrase into meaning the opposite - and one of the greatest predators & perpetrators into a Saint who is “saving the children from pedophile blood-drinking libs”. This opposite-world is an utter disgrace to the millions of souls that were harmed & forgotten by this outrageous tool of misogyny & hatred.
If there was a Satan, he’d be laughing.
Eurgh! I always knew of Peter Ellis' name and that he was probably innocent but I didn't realise the REDICULOUS crimes he was supposed to have perpetrated. I could rant on for days about this but all I'm going to say is the whole satanic panic movement, like QAnon, is just another human example of SOME people WORRYING ABOUT THE WRONG THING! We have ACTUAL ISSUES that NEED YOUR ATTENTION and you're trying to SAVE CHILDREN FROM SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T EVEN EXIST.
Some ideas: climate change and it's coming challenges (that will effect EVERYONE on earth because it's the ENVIRONMENT we LIVE IN) Domestic violence and its insidious erosion of our community, crumbling infrastructure (the poop has gotta go somewhere, into the sea ain't great) our increasingly ageing population and the challenges that will come from that. There, that's 4 things that actually exist right now.
Eurrrgghhh!? Gets me angry.
I'm actually a kiwi living in Oz, back in NZ for a 2 week holiday (fly back this Saturday) and I've been chatting to friends about the state of things, as you do. I feel like most humans right now are just trying to do the best they can living their life, raising their families, working to pay their bills. Then you get these idiots screaming into the void, who we hear because they SCREAM LOUD, and then everyone starts thinking that maybe everything is f**ked... It's much easier to be apathetic if everything is f**ked? Anyway, from what I can see there are coming challenges, but nothing insurmountable if we work together as humans... Rather than listening to keyboard warriors! Gah! Face-palm.
I don't know how we teach people to be more intrigued with the mundane, and not search for entertainment in the news, or other peoples lives. Clearly, sensationalism, when paired with "othering", is incredibly common and disastrously dangerous.
Side note: I was horrified listening to the episode of Armchair Expert with Saul Kassin on False Confessions. There's clearly a massive element of that here in Ellis' case.
Thanks for this piece, David.