More ableist murder
Content warnings: filicide/murder, ableism Two more Autistic children, 4 and 12, along with their mother, 46, have been murdered by their father in Campbelltown. And the father was reportedly inspired by the murders of Leon and Otis in Mosman Park in January this year. Everything I said about the Mosman Park murders applies to Campbelltown. The boys had their whole lives ahead of them, and their mother had decades. They should still be alive. The father's crimes are rephrensible and disgusting. I'm furious and deeply upset. Aside from condemning this ableist murder in the strongest possible terms, I'm also interested in the media reporting. The way media chooses to report about vulnerable populations can be indicative of what society thinks about them, in this case Autistic children. The Mosman Park murders were frequently referred to as deaths, indicative of how the media largely did not care that the children were murdered and part of attempting to justify it. This also included referring to it as a tragedy. Rather than evil crimes. Tragedy implies they were a matter of chance, not intentional behaviour by terrible individuals. To debunk the 'oh but caring for Autistic children is such a burden, I understand why they did it' argument real quick: first, go kick rocks; second, holy condoning murder of vulnerable children Batman; third, yes being a carer can be hard and burnout, etc is valid. What is not valid is murdering Disabled children (or person of any age, to be clear). Similarly, murder is not an inherent result of carer burnout. Murder is a choice. The perpetrators chose to commit murder. I have absolutely no sympathy for those them. Surrendering the boys to the state, for example, is obviously not ideal but would have been infinitely better than 5 murders. I'm going to be picking on The Sydney Morning Herald for the sake of making this point, but I'm certain other outlets will be guilty of the same sin as more report on the murders in Campbelltown. The SMH called the Campbelltown murders what they are - murders. But in an article on the Mosman Park murders, the headline calls them deaths. Deaths. The article also calls them a tragedy. The difference in circumstances? If you ask me, it's that in the more recent murders, the (presumably) abled mother was also a victim. When Autistic children are victims, seemningly the mainstream media does not really care. When the mother is murdered, suddenly they do care and call it what it is. That is absurd hypocrisy and indicative of how ableist Australian society must be if media feels they can get away with that double standard. All 5 of these victims should still be with us. And the media should condemn all 5 murders, and all 3 murderers, in equally strong terms.