I took a lot of flak (as I seem to be doing a lot lately) for writing the following about Hannah Anderson, the teenager a family friend allegedly kidnapped after murdering her mother and younger brother:
Friends will attest to my abiding belief that there was/is much more to this story than a murdering, psycho-obsessed, dirty old man trying to live out a Lolita fantasy in some perverted version of Into the Wild … in the wilderness of Idaho…
She gave credence to my suspicions not just by sharing details of her ordeal in strikingly clinical, if not calculating, fashion, but by complimenting those details with post-kidnap selfies showing her looking like she did not have a care in the world and could not be happier…
She was acting not like a teenage kidnap victim, but like her Disney namesake, Hannah Montana, interacting with her fans the way all teenage pop sensations do these days.
(“Hannah Anderson, Rescued Kidnap Victim, Posts Cutesy Selfies to Help Her Grieve…?” The iPINIONS Journal, August 15, 2013)
My detractors accused me of being not only insensitive to the purportedly grieving Hannah, but also clueless for not appreciating that most teenagers would grieve just as she did in similar circumstances.
Their indignant meme was that it was perfectly normal for Hannah to react the way she did: posting come-hither selfies and hosting chat forums within hours of being “rescued” from a murderous kidnapper and “learning” about her mother and brother’s death, and giving the impression that she felt more like a celebrity craving adoration than a victim seeking sympathy.
Well, whatever the narcissistic grieving habits of teenage girls these days, my detractors will have to consider Hannah’s own family equally insensitive and clueless. Because here’s how they are now echoing my suspicions about Hannah’s “post-traumatic” behavior:
Members of Hannah Anderson’s own family are confused by the 16-year-old’s behaviour in the aftermath of the brutal double murder and her kidnap, with one branding it, ‘downright disturbing’…
[R]elatives admitted to being deeply troubled by Hannah’s apparent lack of grief and string of outlandish, often sexually precocious, postings on social media…
‘We haven’t seen her grieve at all; it’s not the Hannah we know … it’s downright disturbing.’
This, according to a report in yesterday’s edition of the Daily Mail, is the way Hannah’s family members are finally breaking their silence – not for a quick buck on TV, but in a soon to be published book by author and criminal profiler Chelsea Hoffman.
Far more telling, though, is this:
In her book Miss Hoffman examines Hannah’s own account of the events that led up to that day and its aftermath and the book points to what Miss Hoffman considers to be a myriad of inconsistencies and unanswered questions by which some of Hannah’s own relatives admit to being troubled.
(Daily Mail, October 22, 2013)
I’m not going to say, I told you so.
Just stay tuned….
Related commentaries:
Hannah posting selfies to help her grieve…
Horseback riders saved Hannah