Inventor Outed In ESPN Story - Then Commits Suicide

[Carolyn Marie]

This is another tragic story of the media getting it wrong. The article says the story was vetted internally by staff, management and attorneys, and yet not one of them came to the right conclusion. ESPN even has a transsexual sports writer, and she was only consulted after the fact. Very sad, very preventable, very shameful.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/grantland-offers-two-sides-on-divisive-article-about-transgender-inventor-who-killed-herself/2014/01/21/492f8162-82aa-11e3-8099-9181471f7aaf_story.html

Carolyn Marie

[Guest LizMarie]

Sad, completely avoidable, and caused by bigoted sensationalism just because someone was trans.

[Carolyn Marie]

I actually feel sorry for the reporter. I cannot imagine what it must be like to have someone's death on your conscience, whether it was the trans issue or the prospect of being outed as a fraud that caused it. I think the editor's apology is sincere. I just hope other publications learn from it.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest KimberlyF]

Is the correct timeline that this person committed suicide because of research on a story and then was outed after death?

[Carolyn Marie]

Is the correct timeline that this person committed suicide because of research on a story and then was outed after death?

The reporter outed her to an investor during his investigation. Apparently a decision hadn't been reached on whether to publish the story at the time of her death. It would have been reasonable for her to assume that it would be published, and she knew the reporter would reveal her past.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest KimberlyF]

Is the correct timeline that this person committed suicide because of research on a story and then was outed after death?

The reporter outed her to an investor during his investigation. Apparently a decision hadn't been reached on whether to publish the story at the time of her death. It would have been reasonable for her to assume that it would be published, and she knew the reporter would reveal her past.

Carolyn Marie

Fiirst, my life would be so much easier if it wasn't published. If investors got taken a bit by a smooth talker, that is their risk. I hate that these are the types of stories I have to continue to talk about. Plus this orig article is just horrible. He is painful to read.

Now reasonable assumption on her part or not, there was no outing in print prior to the suicide. If Dr. V hadn't made such an elaborate background to woo investors, I highly doubt there'd have been much scrutiny at all. So the media didn't really get anything wrong prior to the suicide.

It's an investigative journalist and from what I understand there were many questions on legality of going to investors with false claims like working on the stealth bomber and having degrees from prestigious universities. Many are saying this stuff should have 100% been published as an investigative reporter.

[VickySGV]

The mention of the TG issues does not appear to me as relevant to the suicide or the investigation. Not cool.

I wish I could say that the suicide as the result of an investigation of financial misdoing is not highly plausible. I had it happen in a case in which I was doing an internal audit of a government agency I worked for. I had done the audit, and found items I needed the help of an employee to explain. I had made an appointment with the person and their supervisor. The employee did not show up for the meeting and was AWOL the following two work days, the third work day they were reported DEAD by the LAPD after a bad smell had been reported at the person's apartment!! No TG issues in my case, just a dead body and some embezzlement findings that were not resolved. I began a new job with a new agency the following week. SIGH

What the Hell has TG got to do with it. (I have some empathy for the reporter, but only a bit.)

[Guest LizMarie]

TG has nothing to do with it.

The news media has long generally followed the rule that they will not out a gay, lesbian, or bisexual person. Why can't they do this with TG people too? Because it's sensationalistic hucksterism.

[Guest KimberlyF]

Well, the simple facts are they didn't out her in the media when she was alive and they did the same thing numerous TG orgs have done over the years-out people after death for their own personal gain. As the saying goes, "He who lives in a glass house shouldn't throw stones."

[Guest LizMarie]

I have read multiple reports about this event. She committed suicide because the story was going to out her without her permission.

To attempt to paint this as after the fact ignores that important piece of information. In short, if Grantland had not made clear to Dr. V. that they intended to out her, would she have still committed suicide? To assert that she would not is to assert omniscience that none of us have. Further, as close friends noted, as soon as she realized she might be outed, she began talking about suicide, which she had attempted several years previously. So the evidence is there that outing her placed her under extreme psychological stress.

In light of the above, I fail to see how anyone can justify Grantland's sensationalistic reporting, which included misgendering her in addition to everything else.

Finally, trying to justify one wrong by pointing to other wrongs doesn't make a right, at least in my book.

[Guest KimberlyF]

It's easy to read history the way one wants. Just find a writer that agrees with them.

The only person who knew with 100% accuracy why this person killed themselves is now dead. Anyone claiming otherwise is asserting omniscience. It is a tragedy like all suicides. Her business was going to take a huge hit and there is no doubt there was going to be a major impact on her life if it broke. That had to stress personal relationships too.

I would guess one reason Vicky has said she has a little empathy is because when something like this happens and the end result is suicide, that has to shake a person.

People do things that they could have no idea of the consequences and people make mistakes. I have shown on topics where there is much gnashing of teeth over a specific reporter for for not following the AP style guide articles by the AP covering the same story...not following the AP style guide, and yet only the one writer who has been targeted is called out.

[Guest KimberlyF]

A friend sent this to me this morning.

It covers a few points I've mentions, and expands from one journalist's POV. There is also the opinion of a TG advocate that makes a point I hadn't considered.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/01/22/pressuring-journalists-won-t-protect-the-transgendered.html

"Dana Beyer, a prominent transgender advocate and medical doctor, dissents from many of Grantlands accusers. She said the piece reflects the tragedy of the transgender closet but did not revel in it. "I know. I lived it for half a century, she told me."

And now my fav part:

"Though Beyer has plenty of problems with the way the media portrays the transgender community, she takes umbrage at "people out there screaming and complaining...Theyre all playing the victim card." She went on: "We made progress on gay rights because gay people decided theyre not going to be victimized. They said, stop allowing yourself to be demonized and victimized. Trans people still have a tendency to do that. Many of us are very broken because weve been closeted for so long. "

Be careful, Dana, they will turn on you.

"We should hope that a firewall exists between Grantland, The New York Times, indeed, any media outlet, and lobbies seeking to influence news coverage, because the best journalism comes from journalists making their own decisions. Should Muslims offended by cartoons of the prophet Muhammed have the final say in what newspaper editors publish? "

Yes. A media that is afraid of offending or taking risks or being shut down becomes ineffectual.

"Beyer, for her part says, "Caleb did a good job. He followed a mystery." She favorably contrasts his story, in which Vanderbilts gender transition was but a thread in a much larger fabric, with how a similar article might have been written 20 years earlier, when the transgender aspect of Vanderbilts life would have been put front and center as an object of ridicule and lurid fascination. "All that stuff was fraudulent, and oh by the way, shes trans," is how Beyer characterizes the Grantland piece."

This is true, and I had never thought of it. I mentioned I thought it was a boring read. Someone asked my opinion on the orig article and I kept reading wondering why. It took me a while to figure out this was about someone who's transitioned. This was after pointing out a bunch of other inconsistencies in Dr. V's wife. My friends send me a bunch of articles to ask my opinion. I don't automatically assume TG theme.

[VickySGV]

Ok, with better information on how the Trans* issue is related, I withdraw my earlier comment on TG NOT being an issue vital to the story. My anecdote is still relevant in that even the best intended investigative jobs do have risk when the investigated person has their own private hell in motion. I agree that we do not have and "Inferno" description of that hell available from the subject who was investigated. The piece Kim cites here does put the thing in a different light. Stuff Happens!!

[Guest Jenni_S]

Yes, I fail to see how the fact that there is no verifiable proof to all of the claimed credentials is, in part, due to that legal name change is not pertinent to the story. This person was a fraud, and was using their name and gender change to help create an entirely new persona, with an intent to defraud people. That's rather significant to what was going on. Looks like conclusions have been jumped to without the full story again, to me.