What's Wrong With This CNN Article? (20)
Feminists see what they want to see and disregard the rest
CNN recently posted yet another gender-biased article, Scientists reveal new details about ‘screaming’ Egyptian mummy’s life and death with the following accompanying image:
What’s wrong with the article?
The answer can be summarized with a small tweak to a line from Simon and Garfunkel’s song The Boxer:
Still feminists see what they want to see
And disregard the rest,
The article is but one of many that focus on how the long-dead woman “may have died in agony”, but disregarding easily-available information that provide much more plausible reasons for the mummy’s open mouth, “screaming” appearance.
Although the CNN article’s title didn’t mention the “woman in agony” assumption, plenty of other reports did:
Both the CNN article and the referenced study mentioned cadaveric spasm — “a rare form of muscular stiffening associated with violent deaths, implying that the woman died screaming from agony or pain” — as proof that the woman died violently, but according to this source,
Very little to no pathophysiological or scientific basis exists to support the validity of cadaveric spasms. Chemically, this phenomenon cannot be explained as being analogous to “true” rigor mortis. Therefore, a variety of other factors have been examined and explored in an effort to alternatively account for the cases of supposed instantaneous rigor mortis that have been reported. In a study reported in The International Journal of Legal Medicine, there was no consistent evidence of cadaveric spasms even in deaths of the same type.
Decades of feminist indoctrination that “women are always victims” has led the authors of these articles — almost all women, it should be noted — about the screaming mummy to see what they want to see. Each and every one of them (and their respective publications) should take the time to reevaluate their gender-biased assumptions about this long-dead woman.
They can start by reading Screaming Mummies! from Archeology magazine, that provides a good analysis on the underlying science why we see a screaming woman:
“During infancy we have learned to 'read' expressions on others' faces and translate the messages that such expressions transmit. ...The perpetual interpretation of others' expressions during the human interactions that are part of our daily social intercourse, therefore, lead us inevitably to read and respond emotionally to the expression we see when viewing the face of a mummified corpse … Essentially we're programmed to look at a face and decode the person's emotions. But the expressions of mummies cannot be used to predict their emotional state at the moment of death… [emphasis added]”
The article ends with the following observation:
The compelling results--the screaming mummies--have, and will undoubtedly continue to, inspire journalists and documentary script writers, book-jacket designers, movie producers, and maybe an artist now and then. But, then again, as my colleague Paul Bahn points out, "How do we know they aren't singing?"