The Annie Le Media Fest: It’s Not Just About the Ivies

As Jack Shafer observes in yesterday's column, the Annie Le murder has received the sort of national coverage usually reserved for celebrity deaths and award-show gaffes. To wit, Shafer's incomplete but telling catalog:

The New York Times...has already published five articles about Le's disappearance and murder and the apprehension of suspect Raymond Clark III. The Boston Globe has published at least six stories about the case, and the Washington Post has run at least three briefs from the Associated Press. The Times of London, published five time zones away, can't seem to sate its appetite for Annie Le news. Even the proletarian New York tabloids—the Post and the Daily News—have gone ape for the story.

...besides which, a slew of well-sourced and quick-response articles in the university's paper of record, and, by my count, two cover spots in the Washington Post Express.

My problem with Shafer's piece isn't his gripe that crimes at Yale and Harvard receive undue attention. (They do; always have.) I went to Yale—graduated, even—and Shafer's points are well taken. But what the media critic misses is that, when it comes to murder, the Ivy League's disproportionate share of media attention is part of a larger, and more regrettable, trend.

Read More "The Annie Le Media Fest: It’s Not Just About the Ivies" »