A local newspaper with affiliations to The University of Birmingham recently published a full page ad for commemorative china, with a twist. Instead of the usual, royal wedding, Olympic games type plates, these had the faces of serial killers and murderers on. The newspaper received several complaints on the grounds that the plates were disrespectful and or upsetting to the victims’ families. The chances that one of the victim’s family members happening across a Birmingham based paper with what I would imagine is a very limited circulation aside, would the images honestly have been more upsetting for them than any other article?
I can only imagine that every bit of media coverage about serial killers, whether it’s from a fictional or criminal psychology perspective, serves as just as big a reminder of what the victim’s families have lost as the last. The University of Birmingham previously allowed the newspaper to be distributed on campus but has now severed all ties with the newspaper in question, condemning them for running the ad. Was it really such a bad thing though? The newspaper was not advocating that what the serial killers did was commendable, merely highlighting that, if anyone were so inclined, they could send off for a plate as a novelty item. From what I gathered the ad was intended with any malice, but with a certain tongue in cheek humour that us Brits are so famed for, so that’s all I chose to see it as.
http://www.birminghammail.net/news/top-stories/2009/02/17/university-of-birmingham-students-defend-sick-spoof-child-killers-advert-97319-22939909/
17/02/09
Tuesday 17 February 2009
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