Janet CollinsHero Worship of the Worst Kind
April 30th 2010 23:00
Since the murder of notorious gangland killer, Carl Williams, in Barwon Prison, south west of Melbourne on 19 April, the media have gone into a frenzy. It has been front page news ever since and his funeral and burial yesterday received no less attention. Why?
The story of Carl Williams may be a good one for a television crime series and the popularity of the Underbelly series reflected our insatiable appetite for crime drama and the gangster world, but should it be so prominent in our news and media? So prominent has it been in the last week and a half that Carl Williams in death has been elevated to a level of cult status. That seems so wrong.
His daughter, Dhakota, in her eulogy said her father was a “family man”. It may be honourable for a daughter to remember her father in such light but Williams was certainly no “family man”. Williams killed people and when he wasn’t doing that, he was instructing others to do so. These people, although no angels themselves, had families too.
His funeral yesterday, some 11 days after he was fatally bashed in prison, was so prominent on news coverage that it was listed as the most popular news item on the ABC website last night.
The story had all the ingredients of a soap opera – even the added touch of a gold plated coffin and 100 mourners to see him off. But before we get too caught up in the intrigue that has followed this story since 19 April, we should remember the words of Supreme Court Justice Betty King in sentencing him back in 2007.
In handing Williams a life sentence, King said to Williams “You are a killer and a cowardly one who employed others to do the actually killing”.
When was it exactly that we all started worshipping cowards?
Image credit: www.smh.com.au
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Comment by Wilson Pon
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By the way, I didn't know whether you notice it or not, that the personality distortion or Cognitive Distortion is becoming familiar in nowadays. Honestly, if this situation continue, it can cause a lot of trouble to human kind!
Comment by Tracy
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Comment by Janet Collins
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Yes, we certainly do have our priorities all mixed up. The media coverage has certainly glorified and glamorised the whole gangster thing.
Thanks for the visit.
Comment by Janet Collins
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After seeing all the attention the death of this creep got over the past few weeks I couldn't help but think that our news has become like our television drama and our shows are all now reality ones.
I too thought it was all a bit too much.
Nice to see you and good of you to visit.
Comment by Jason King
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I have been changing channels - I have absolutely no care in the world for him, I do feel for his daughter though.
Good to see u pointing it out - all other media people are enamoured - totally annoying.
Comment by Janet Collins
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Comment by ShaunK
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Comment by Janet Collins
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It makes news. Much more I dare say than anything really worthwhile like the environment or mental health issues. But what can we do?