Pedophiles, Abortifacients, (non)Terrorists on Planes, Oh My!

I've tried to miss as much of the news about the Jon Benet Ramsay murder case and the suspected killer John Mark Karr (yes, I remember the names...) as much as possible. I remember the days that this murder occurred. The face of that poor child splashed on the screen brought many fears as I watched my own girls play. ...

But the obscenity of the child's death has become obsession and addiction for many others. The signs of despair that these phenomena represent call for some commentary. Two of the best I've read include those written by jodi dean @ I Cite (here and here)

Dean writes:

There are different deaths; some that precede the lives that would have been lived; some deaths are opportunities for tabloid hauntings, imagined lives. Deaths of innocents made repugant in pagentry and tabloid pornographic desire. Deaths in advance of living that call into question the very terms within which one might live (and rightly so: Tom is a freak and poor Katie a prisoner). But these, I don't think, are superficial. Not at all. They resonate with an innocence that only appeared by being made up, sexualized, and in death or in its absence and fanticized disfigurement.