Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember Steve Walker
saying something like:
I doubt there are many more instances of child abduction /
interference etc than say 30 or 40 years ago. The difference is
that *everybody* now has easy access to news media and is willing
to go that route.
KK
I certainly saw a documentary (probably around eight years ago)
where they asserted that the number of children kidnapped and
abused/murdered hadn't changed for fifty years, so as you say, it is
most likely just that there is a lot more reporting of it.
Exactly.
I'm reminded of a study of the so-called 'crimewave' of the 1960s (of
which the tabloid rags made a big deal), done a few years later.
Turned out the incidence of real crimes hadn't increased at all, it's
just that almost every house had a phone in it by the end of the 60s,
so the reported crimes shot up, in lockstep with the number of phones.
Co-incidence? I think not.
Rather like the increase in the number of 'alcohol related' hospital
admissions coinciding with the police decision (after a few deaths) not to
keep drunks in cells overnight to sleep it off. Now its left to the
ambulance service to take them to A&E to sleep it off.
Same amount of drunks, different paperwork.
--
Dave - The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk