The family receives very little help when Ruthie goes missing. A police officer tells them (p. 18), “If you were so concerned about the girl, you’d have taken better notice, I guess.” How do you think this scenario would have been different today? What factors do you think influence a quick response when someone disappears?
Not a lot of difference today. In the news when Indigenous women go missing they are not looked for by law enforcement as when Caucasian women go missing. This is very sad.
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I don’t think it would play much different now, to be honest. Minority groups often still struggle to be heard and to matter
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We have much better communications today. It would not have worked to be so close by in today’s world. If Ruthie’s picture had been sent around right away there is a good chance she would have been found quickly.
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I have to agree with Paula_Walters and Rebecca Gaulton about what would happen today if the same scenario played out with regard to minority groups. Technology advancements could/should make it easier to work cases involving missing cases, but that technology is only as good as the police department’s willingness to use it. I saw an interview on 11/21/24 about the Jon Benoit Ramsey murder and upcoming documentary (on Netflix?), and although she was white, the local police department chose (and continues to choose) not to tap into other available resources such as the FBI and genetic DNA evaluation. In The Berry Pickers, the local police department chose to limit the “search” to their own department and from the way the story was written, it appears that even years later, there was no “cold case” team to keep the case alive.
I do tend to think that missing white people - particularly those in the suburbs - receive more attention than other groups (especially if they’re a pretty, teenage girl). I think, though, that when very young children go missing there’s usually a fairly serious effort made to find them, regardless of race or economic factors. And, given the fact that Ruthie had a close family (i.e., there were no estranged partners lurking about) I think today she would have been found relatively quickly.
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Not so sure I agree with you Kim. I agree with Paula and Rebecca. Minority groups are overlooked.
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I tend to agree with Kim in that I think if it were a child, regardless of race, people tend to be more invested in finding them.
Although I do agree with others comments that indigenous women especially seem to be invisible and fall through the cracks and are often never found or even looked for.
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If a minority child of migrant workers went missing today, I doubt that any more effort from local authorities would be made. It would still be up to the family to try to find the missing child. Technology might make things a little easier but I rather doubt local law enforcement would be much help. The problem of missing indigenous women is just as bad as it has been.
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In some places it might have improved, but reading the news, I see stories regularly about police ignoring or abusing people of color who have sought their help.
In the story, it didn’t help that no one had seen Ruthie be picked up on a country road—vs. a city street or neighborhood. I suspect the absence of a lead makes it easier for police to justify to themselves their inaction when prejudice is involved.
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As an African American woman, I don’t feel the same actions are consistently done for people who are people of color, a certain class, and/or education. These people are not seen by society as favorably. A non-white, migrant child gone missing would not have an amber alert.
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The police describe the first 24 hours as the golden hour. Meaning if you are going to find clues and hopefully the missing person this is the time to do it. I feel that the press and the police still give priority to a white child, especially if middle or upper class is missing. I want the same attention for all missing people, especially children. I do believe it has gotten a little better due to people speaking up and books. However, I do not believe it is equal, even today,
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I think the police have procedures that must be followed no matter who is missing. However, behind the scenes, I’m sure certain people of privilege get preferential treatment or attention paid to their case. Indians were on such a lower caste status to some authorities that I imagine not much energy was expanded trying to find them…except the bare minimum. The family knew that and if Ruthie was to be found, the onus was on them…not the police.
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Today, it would have been a similar scenario. In the TV Series “Three Pines”, when indigenous women disappeared, the police were hiding facts. Check this article “Why Are Indigenous Women Disappearing Across Canada?”
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If the situation happened today, the optimist in me wants to hope and believe it would be different, but the realist in me feels there’s a chance it wouldn’t. There have been improvements in finding missing cases, and this is not just based on feelings, but factually, there have been strides. “Missing children have become more publicized in the United States over the past two decades, which has resulted in nearly 98% of these missing children being located (“National Child Kidnapping Facts”). While this is promising, there are severe racial disparities in the statistics of the 2% who are still missing.”
The 2% the article references is why I hesitate to confidently say Ruthie would’ve been found today. I still believe there is a disparity in treatment and urgency for when a person of color, even if they are a child, goes missing versus a white child.
Simply put, there is still a discrepancy in the amount of coverage, which is the reason behind the 2% gap. If you are interested in reading more factual data behind it, this article delves into the reasons more. America’s Black Children are Missing at Disproportionately High Rates, and How the Amber Alert is at Fault by Julia Kearney | First-Year Writing | Elon University
A note as well that is tangential:
The moment the child’s name of Ruthie was revealed, it immediately reminded me of a book I read called What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez? by Claire Jimenez which ended up being one of my favorite stories I read in 2023. In this story, we follow a family where their youngest daughter, ALSO named Ruthy!!!, goes missing at the age of 10?. And we follow the family years after her disappearance. What is different is this book is more humorous in tone, following a Puerto Rican family in Staten Island. Years later, they believe they discovered their Ruthy to be cast on a reality TV show, and the plot unravels from there as we find out what happened to Ruthy. So if the subject matter of a family saga around a missing child intrigues you, I would recommend this!
To return to the original questions, after reading both these stories and researching missing children, my answer is potentially yes. It could be different, but there’s still room for improvement to make it a confident yes.
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I don’t think it would be any different today. There have been many missing Hispanic women, indigenous woman and women of color who have disappeared and their cases haven’t been investigated. I think the cases that are the most investigated are those of young white females.
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I agree with your point about young white females investigated more. I think they also receive much more publicity.
There have been several segments on the news lately about the number of missing indigenous people in Montana where approximately 30% of the people reported missing are indigenous people where less than 10% of it’s population is indigenous. While there was a lot of success in closing cases back in 2021, the closure rate (finding the person or their body) has sky rocketed in the last few years. I can’t recall ever seeing a specific story about a missing indigenous person.
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The degree of callousness surprised me - there has been a lot of attention paid to this type of disparity in recent years. I think the spotlight being shone on the different treatment of whites vs people of color will promote change going forward.