Basic Trope: The news covers the search for middle-to-upper class white women more than any other.
- Straight: The blonde white Alice goes missing, and the news covers her search. The same day, Hispanic girl Maria goes missing, and the news mentions it in passing (or not at all).
- Exaggerated:
- No one, not even her immediate family, has any idea that Maria is missing and in danger. Alice, on the other hand, receives 24-hour coverage on every news network.
- A bus full of Hispanic girls vanishes. News outlets completely ignore this to focus on Alice... who was also on the bus at the time.
- Downplayed: Maria gets a reasonable amount of news coverage, but still not as much as Alice.
- Justified:
- The news media were only alerted about Alice's disappearance; for whatever reason(s), no one bothered to alert the media when Maria went missing.
- Alice is a very prominent member of the community, such as the President's daughter; Maria is not.
- The news media is racist, and as such, doesn't care about what happens to Maria.
- Alice and Maria were supposed to have the same amount of airtime, but Alice went first, and Maria's report was interrupted by an emergency weather broadcast.
- Inverted:
- The news covers the search for Maria, but only mentions Alice's disappearance in passing (or not at all).
- The news covers the search for Bob, but barely mentions Miguel's disappearance. Or vice versa.
- A Serial Killer who is a beautiful white woman becomes an infamous criminal through media coverage.
- Subverted:
- The news covers the search for Alice, even though she is poor.
- And then the newscaster realizes that she mixed the pictures up: Alice was the Latina, not Maria. She continues the broadcast, focusing on Latina!Alice.
- Double Subverted:
- But she is still white, and still perceived as a "good" girl by mainstream society, which the media considers more "marketable".
- ...And when she finishes with Alice, she spends several hours on White!Maria.
- Parodied:
- When told Alice is missing, the first thing the reporters want to know is if she's a blonde white girl.
- Karen accidentally wanders into an employee backroom and can't find the way out. A missing person case is filed for her and immediately appears on every news station.
- Reporters clamor for coverage of Alice's disappearance...until they learn she is a white-passing ethnic minority and immediately lose interest.
- Zig-Zagged:
- Both Alice and Maria get roughly equal coverage, even though the producers are shown telling the reporters to focus on Alice. Then rumors that Maria might be dead start circulating, and attention abruptly moves to her. As soon as the rumors fade out, though, the reporters start talking only about Alice.
- Alice and Maria get kidnapped, but less attention is put to Alice's kidnapping because "plenty of people are already looking for pretty white girls to save"...which turns out to be wrong. Maria gets the resulting media spotlight, police, and happy ending, but then gets promptly forgotten about when she's returned home; by contrast, once Alice's case is resumed, there are constant updates to how well she's doing after being brought back... until she gets passed over for cuter, more tragic girls to cover, of which she (like Maria) is just one in a million.
- Averted:
- The news coverage of Alice and Maria is equal.
- Both Alice and Maria are safe, present, and accounted for.
- Enforced: The corrupt network head only lets the reporters cover the white woman stories because it gets better ratings. Somehow he manages to get away with this.
- Lampshaded: "We know that lots of people of all colors disappear all the time, but the nation has never been so consumed with any of them as when the beautiful Alice got abducted..."
- Invoked: Maria is kidnapped because she knows something she shouldn't. Alice was kidnapped as a cover to distract the media.
- Exploited:
- The villain never kidnaps/kills young white girls, knowing that they get the most media coverage.
- The villain wants media coverage, so he only kidnaps/kills young white girls.
- Alice fakes her own kidnapping for a week so she can milk the dispreportionately huge media circus when she decides to return.
- Defied: The news anchor sees the stories about Maria and Alice, and refuses to let Alice's story hog the whole timeslot.
- Discussed: "I feel bad for Alice's family, but does anyone so much as mention Maria?"
- Conversed: "Y'know, with all the coverage Alice is getting, you'd think no one else has gone missing at the same time. At this rate, I'd have to go digging to see what other missing persons cases are open."
- Deconstructed:
- If more people knew about Maria's disappearance, they might have information that can be brought to law enforcement officials. It also says to those who don't have the "right" skin color or live the "right" lifestyle in the "right" community that they don't matter.
- Maria's family is understandably upset about their daughter's disappearance being ignored.
- Played for Laughs: Alice and Maria walk down to the candy store without telling their parents. Said parents go to the police. The cops listen and take notes while acting sympathetically toward Alice's mom, but they forget what they were doing in the middle of questioning Maria's dad. The entire community goes into a panic over Alice and literally tear apart the neighborhood looking for her while Maria's dad walks home and sees Maria and Alice sitting on the couch watching cartoons. He calls Alice's mom to explain what happened... And gets arrested for kidnapping.
- Played for Drama: The increased news coverage leads to Alice being recovered alive, but Maria is killed... And Maria's community gets into an uproar.
- Implied: Maria's parents tell the sad story of their missing daughter to a friend. When asked why they haven't heard about it on the news, Maria's father rolls his eyes and says, "Alice was missing too".
Back to Missing White Woman Syndrome.
