HEY, MEDIA! Gay men are missing in Florida!

[Bluebear]

Not as salacious as the "Runaway Bride"? Not as pretty as the poor girl missing in Aruba? What's the deal, why is THIS not national news?

====
Jamie Malernee
Staff Writer
Posted May 28 2005
Police are investigating whether two men suspected of raping and killing gay men in the Tampa area are also responsible for three disappearances in Fort Lauderdale.

One of the suspects, Steven Lorenzo, 46, of Tampa owns a condo across the street from the Drake Tower Condominium, where three gay men have been missing since 1988. The other, Illinois native Scott Schweickert, 39, confessed to picking up men at a Tampa gay bar with Lorenzo in December 2003 and raping and killing two victims, according to a federal affidavit.

Fort Lauderdale police have no evidence of a local connection but are handing out fliers and asking for help.

"It's a disturbing coincidence," said Bruce Tanner, property manager of the Drake. "It's a similar situation. The fellows simply disappeared without a trace."

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-carrests28may28,0,4359104.story?coll=sfla-news-broward

[atommom]

1. If only they had been rich pretty white women...

Then we'd be hearing about it 24/7! I hope they catch those creeps fast.

[alfredo]

2. You have to be female, white, cute, and rich to merit

media coverage.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. Sorry. If you're not a young, pretty blue-eyed blonde woman

from a "good" family, you can disappear and the news media won't pay much attention. Old? Fat? Homely? Minority? Poor? Gay? Too bad, you're not cute enough for the big-time newsies to run your story on a national network. No Amber Alerts, no pictures on milk cartons, no helicopters, no interviews with sobbing family members on Good Morning America or CNN. A little local coverage, maybe, then down the memory hole.

[etherealtruth]

4. Oh come on, this blonde stuff is too much ...

... as long as you are white, blue eyed ... you can be a brunette too; you just have to be from an "even better" family.

[radar]

11. So, as a precaution...

All those not meeting the media/Hollywood criteria should be advised to have a personal photo "touched up" to more closely resemble the mainstream image of beauty.

Friends & family would then have that eye-pleasing picture to distribute to all concerned.

Thereby increasing the chances of a bigger effort by rescuers to find the "attractive" missing person.

*This has been an attempt at dark humor....

[babylonsister]

5. In is out, up is down. This doesn't make any sense

to me either. Thanks for bringing this to my attention; I wouldn't have known about it otherwise. Certainly not from the MSM or DU. x(

[kweerwolf]

6. There's at least one similar case here in Kansas City ...

... from a couple of years ago. The guy, who was an accountant, simply vanished. His car was found in a park that's popular as a cruising area, but it's not certain whether he took it there or someone else just left it there. There were a couple of local news stories about it, then it just disappeared out of the spotlight. The police showed his photo around some of the bars, but apparently nothing turned up in the investigation.

[ultraist]

7. We should email this story to the national media outlets

And ask them WHY they aren't covering a SERIAL MURDERER!!!

[hector459]

8. So, they RAPED and killed two gay men? Hmmmmm

What does that make them...surpressed homosexual rapist and murderers?

[Zhade]

9. Oh, come on, some of them have only been missing for 17 years.

It's not like this is a big deal. I mean, they're just fags, you know?

:sarcasm:

[Eloriel]

10. Some of the posters here make it sound like

if you're white and pretty you don't DESERVE to have your case cared about.

The truth is that EVERYONE who is missing deserves the utmost concern from all of us. This anti-blonde, PRETTY, white female attitude here is giving me the creeps. She too deserves the attention you would want for YOUR child were s/he to go missing.

[Bluebear]

12. Of course she does.

Fact is, though, the national news media seems to be drawn to certain cases more than others. Witness the number of people who have never heard about these Florida cases.

>EVERYONE who is missing deserves the utmost concern from all of us.<

I could not agree more.