Nicola Bulley’s social media ‘sleuths’ are wrong but the trolling won’t stop
HOPEFULLY, none of us will ever have to know what it was like for Nicola Bulley’s family.
They lived through absolutely agonising uncertainty following her disappearance one January morning after she dropped her two daughters at school.
At the time, the details of what had happened to her felt like the start of an Agatha Christie novel.
Her spaniel was found running loose near the River Wyre in Lancashire.
Her mobile phone — still connected to a work Teams call — was placed on a nearby bench.
There were no signs of a struggle, yet there was no trace of her.
It was a mystery.
And so, the whole nation, or so it seemed, became amateur Hercule Poirots, intent on speculating about what had happened to her.
Worse still, some people chose to descend on the scene — seeking some kind of ghoulish gratification from proximity — which caused chaos in Nicola’s small village to the point that the police had to ask them to stay away.
People offered to find her under the water.
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Do you remember Peter Faulding, who confidently said his team would be able to find her quickly in the river if she was there, using a sonar scanner?
He didn’t actually find her — when in fact her body was there all the time — but it only heightened the mystery and super-charged the speculation over what had happened.
Downright nasty
Worse than the conspiracy theories were the rumours about Nicola herself, the claims that she was a drunk, and badly affected by the menopause.
All this happened when she was still missing and seemed to be the epitome of victim-blaming.
The endless discussion surrounding this case caused delay and undermined the police investigation.
It is grim that, as a nation, we were more engrossed with the conspiracy than the fact that at the heart of a case was a real woman, with real children and a real husband who were utterly devastated by her disappearance.
And guess what? All the meddling amateur sleuths got it wrong.
This week a coroner concluded that Nicola drowned after slipping into an icy river.
Her family spoke about how the “wildly inaccurate social media speculation” has impacted them.
They said: “It’s upsetting that we’ve continued to receive negative targeted messages and still witness wildly inaccurate speculation being shared over numerous platforms.”
I am angry that Nicola’s family, who are still in the depths of the worst year of their life, were compelled to make a statement appealing to the public to “look at the facts”, to “ignore any amateur views and opinions” and to be “mindful of the impact words bring”.
Why on earth are internet trolls — who are these people? — continuing to send Nicola’s heartbroken, grieving family “negative targeted messages”.
People on social media are so cruel.
Social media is anything but “social” sometimes — it’s downright nasty.
And it has led to people becoming obsessed with inserting themselves into the story, getting involved, being in the feed.
Social media is fuelling insane behaviour.
Hopefully this case is a lesson to the amateur sleuths who got it so, so wrong and who caused such offence that, in future, they will leave the detective work to the experts.
Losing safety of loos
THE news a teenage boy has reportedly been arrested after female pupils were allegedly sexually assaulted in gender-neutral school toilets is truly shocking.
But it is also a timely reminder that gender neutral spaces – in schools or anyway else for that matter – are not always safe.
I am not, and nobody is, saying that all men and boys are predatory.
But some are.
And those that are will be drawn to a gender neutral space, where girls and women are not protected, like a moth to a flame.
Apparently police were called in over four allegations of “serious sexual assault” at an Essex school, where three of the alleged attacks took place in toilets that can be used by both boys and girls.
The school reportedly has a number of gendered toilets to be used by boys or girls as well as a set of “open suite” cubicles that can be used by either sex.
This comes as the Government is expected to publish transgender guidance for schools in the coming days.
I know this may not be a popular view but for girls at school the toilet is a safe space; a place to go to catch up with your pals and gossip, adjust your tights if you need to, reapply your make-up or just have a break from everyone – especially the boys.
We don’t want gender neutral toilets and certainly don’t want to be assaulted in them.
Kate so clever
I’M not surprised that the Princess of Wales was the one who pushed for the “recollections may vary” response in the Queen’s statement after Harry and Meghan accused the Royal Family of being racist to Oprah Winfrey.
Cool, calm, collected and clever Kate.
The perfect woman to one day be the next Queen.
Great catch, Jonny
ALTHOUGH their aims are in many ways laudable, I am sorry to say that the activists from the Just Stop Oil campaign lost their audience long ago.
Their disruptive, attention-seeking crusades (and yes, I know that is the point) are just so annoying that they are in danger of losing the message completely.
So it was satisfying to see the Oxford student who invaded the pitch at Lord’s during The Ashes last week in the name of Just Stop Oil being bundled off again by Jonny Bairstow.
Daniel Knorr, a 21-year-old biochemistry under- graduate, was one of three people arrested after running on to the cricket pitch as orange powder was hurled.
England wicketkeeper Jonny was having none of it, and simply carried him across the outfield.
Good on you Jonny!
Which hunt wins?
GUESS what? It turns out that one of the oldest stereotypes about men and women isn’t true.
A new study has found that female members of many of the world’s remaining foraging societies are just as involved in hunting as men – even though the narrative has always been that men hunted while women gathered.
But it turns out that women hunt in the majority of foraging cultures and use a greater variety of weapons and hunting strategies than their male counterparts.
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In short, women are more efficient than men when it comes to providing food for their families.
Why doesn’t that surprise me at all?