>But neither “Serial” (which is otherwise notable for its thoroughness) nor “Making a Murderer” ever addresses the question of what rights and considerations sh

>But neither “Serial” (which is otherwise notable for its thoroughness) nor “Making a Murderer” ever addresses the question of what rights and considerations should be extended to victims of violent crime, and under what circumstances those might justifiably be suspended. Instead, both creators and viewers tacitly dismiss the pain caused by such shows as collateral damage, unfortunate but unavoidable. Here, too, the end is taken to justify the means; someone else’s anguish comes to seem like a trifling price to pay for the greater cause a documentary claims to serve. Aww come the hell on! The public has a very strong interest in monitoring the criminal justice system. We cannot do that without knowledge of the crimes and the victims. Yes, it sucks for them. Crime is bad. But the public cannot hope to establish and direct a justice system capable of deterring crime without learning facts about actual prosecutions, which unfortunately includes information about the victim and what was done to them. Besides, the vast majority (possibly all, IIRC) of the footage of Hallbach's family consisted of public interviews of her brother. You can't repeatedly and voluntarily thrust yourself into the media spotlight and then cry foul when people use that footage. What serious journalist really thinks this is a reasonable argument to make? Are we supposed to turn a blind eye to police corruption and inadequate due process because it makes one person and their family uncomfortable?