I was even on a jury for an alerted post that was linking to a picture of one of the initial "suspects" - I didn't want DU to bear any responsibility for potentially ruining an innocent person's life (see Richard Jewell) so I voted to hide.

It was 5-1 to leave it. Ugh. Humans.

Those threads have been depressing. We're really no better than freepers sometimes when it comes to baseless speculation and determination to pin the tail on the donkey when it comes to our favourite villains.

We should all remember Richard Jewell. I've never forgotten how the mob turned on him because he looked wrong to be a hero. RIP, Richard.

We all have our prejudices, but not all of us are aware of them enough to keep them from influencing our opinions. I myself was so willing to believe that one of the hyper-Christian fathers of one of the child victims in the West Memphis three case was the killer that it was downright humbling to be proven wrong and to realise I was as much pre-judging as the West Memphis community itself had been.

"It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts" -- Sherlock Holmes

The author may have been a gullible faery-fancier, but he had a way with words.

In every disaster, the press is looking for IMMEDIATE sound bites. The juicier, more sensational, the better. The most screamingly sensational quote-givers are at the top of the reporters' contacts lists.

Just about every competent, knowledgeable person will say something to the effect of "let's not speculate. Let's wait until investigators have a chance to look at the evidence." These folks are at the bottom of the reporters' contacts lists.

Reporters these days do not believe that it is part of their job to get their facts right. Or to use reasonable "experts".

Unfortunately, reporters who use reasonable experts, and relate their opinions that "this is nothing", or "this might turn out to be something, but we just don't know yet", or even "this is serious, & it'll take some time & effort to fix" loses out to the reporter who writes "while not all experts agree, Dr. Looney Tunes believes that this is the end of the world as we know it."

The examples are depressingly common, and now that news media are now publicly owned companies with shareholders & stock value driving the competition, I have no idea if there is a way to fix the problem.