Apparently within the last day or so there has been a social media freakout about the seemingly vast number of children who have gone missing in Iowa lately (see: “In Just the Last Two Weeks, Dozens of Children in Iowa Have Vanished“). While the numbers are accurate, the numbers don’t tell the whole story:
- The numbers do not represent an uptick, but are in line with the average
- The great majority of those who have “vanished” just ran away from home and are back in a day or two of being reported missing.
So in effect this is akin to the “pink tax” or the “wage gap” in terms of being an easily mis-reported outrage-generator. Leave out a few details and the story changes a *lot.*
This of course is not to say that nothing truly nefarious is occurring. Kids do sometimes get kidnapped and disappear. Truly horrific things can happen. Monsters exist. The “humor” produced by the likes of Dan Harmon and James Gunn certainly speaks to the dark oily mass of rancid filth that forms the core of some people, and such folk should be kept an eye out for. But that said, the statistics do not support getting worked up about this. I am old enough to remember the Satanic Panic of the 80’s, the nightmare of “recovered memories,” the McMartin Prechool fiasco, the cultural disaster that was and is “stranger danger.” Todays moral panics include the O Noes Nazis Everywhere nonsense and the fear of violent crime (which is down 50% from the peak in the 90’s). As Jonathan Swift pointed out, Falsehoods flies, and the Truth comes limping after it.