With the hindsight that living in a different era gives us we can easily see that for some of these women, it was the strict, inflexible mores of Victorian society that led them to their fates, and had they lived in different times, may have had very different outcomes.
It will not be a surprise to many that the News of The World would be tangled up in this most shady episode as they became a by-word for the absolute worst of tabloid journalism, souring countless lives, with it's underhand tactics.
And we, the general public, we put our faith in these systems, while not understanding their operations and flaw, because what other choice do we have? We could live in a world where we feel safe and therefore powerful, or we could live in a reality where the good don't always triumph, where the truth doesn't always come out, and where a family in Hyderabad sit, with no justice for their daughter.
When Laura Van Whye's body was found close to a highway some people assumed she had been hit by a truck, and some people have choosen to believe that over the last twenty five years. Laura however had friends and family who were willing to continue looking for answers, her mother has spent years trying …
Continue reading Bonapart: A True Crime Podcast about the death of Laura Van Whye
I give Mr Syed a well deserved A for his assignment, and hope he will indeed continue a carear in journalisim, as discussed in the last episode, the greatest struggle is to tell the truth.
Kirat not only frees herself, there is power in speaking the truth, but she also asks important questions of those who are there not only to protect us, but whom we also expect to help deliver justice when things do go wrong. Currently Kirat is a sole voice in the wilderness, but I do not believe she will be on her own, for very long.
It is shame, and it's opposite, pride and indifference which are at the core of this story. It highlights that the shame of infertility can be profoundly damaging, and the inflexible gender ideas around it, procreation and parenthood fence people in. It was Karbaat's pride and indifference to the mothers, fathers and children he was creating that was the catalyst for the whole thing.
In a system that is largely run by private business it was probably inevitable that sooner or later the profit-before-all fake-it-till-you-make-it narcissism of many businesses considered successful today would finally also hit American health care. As ever, while rich people play at saving the world, the ordinary among us are the ones who pay the price in our lives.
Mark pays a heavy price for his cowardice, his inability to face up to reality and do the mature, adult thing in a difficult and tense situation. I feel that Mark might be paying this price for the rest of his life, but Meredith pays a heavier price for her involvement with Mark.
The unpretentious, no frills way that Debbie presents us with the series of events, and their ultimate effect on her life, with very few interuptions is a masterclass in letting a story tell itself, and should be considered gold standard for true crime podcasting everywhere.
