My wife enjoys watching crime programs on TV. On Monday, it was a Netflix story about Gabby Petito; last night, it was the first few installments of a program about the Idaho murders. What do these programs have in common, other than homicides? In both of them, amateur sleuths operating on social media mercilessly harass innocent bystanders and family members and make life difficult for law enforcement in their attempts to gain followers by pursuing what they pass off as the “truth.”
To a populist, everyone with access to a smartphone is an expert. These programs are proof, if it was ever needed, that some issues need to be left to the real experts.