The Azaria Chamberlain Madeleine McCann Show
June 4, 2025
By NZB3
Little girl lost, Madeline McCann, hasn’t been seen since 2007. Since then her humanity has been truly eclipsed by media spectacle which reduces her to an invisible zombie. Every year or so the specter of the little dead girl ‘we’ refuse to let die will be resurrected and paraded. In 2025 this has just happened once again…
“Detectives” are carrying out “a broad range” of searches a Portuguese police statement. Ref. Stuff (3 June, 2025)
You’ll observe that this is a story about anonymous police who have nothing to say about people supposed to be experts (detectives) taking a vague interest in matters unknown. This is enough to reanimate the corpse of the lost girl again and make international headlines including here in New Zealand.
Prior to McCanne (2007) the same Media Feedback Loop had another target: Azaria Chamberlain. A grieving but composed parent, Lindy Chamberlain, had a great hook “a dingo stole my baby,” she said. That lost child of 1980 served as hardware for 27 years until finally wearing down. Then, the old software was re-installed with an all-new location, cast, and victim centered around little Madeline. This, the McCann industry, has been trading for almost 20 year. It must nearly be time for another girl to be lost and sensationalised.
Let’s put a little thought into how this macabre news cycle works. And, remember that every “news” outlet and every presenter and writer involved is in on this. Every newsreader who participates, every uncle, each politician, every policeman, every ‘detective’, every parent who helps keep this thing going wants views and money and willingly trades in innocent dead girl parts to get them.
(Note also that a similar cycle exists when it comes to moa and moose sightings.)
1. Inciting Incident
Photogenic little girl (Azaria Chamberlain, Madeleine McCann) goes missing. Public empathy and shock are high. Initial grief is quickly overtaken and replaced by media attention. Rank media promotion is let loose behind a shield of pretense of care for a little girl’s welfare. Photogenic parents become a well to drink from and ‘investigators’ get a fame/money boost by fleeting involvement.
2. Media Circus Begins
The tabloids and major outlets descend for emotional, sensational coverage. The lost girl is transmuted into a poster child. Reporting becomes less about facts and more about narrative arcs: hope, betrayal, suspicion, redemption, etc.
Cameras follow around Lindy Chamberlain. Maybe they hound her and poke at her. Gerry and Kate McCann too.
3. Stakeholders Learn the Game
And maybe they Chamberlain and McCann join in and make a career of it. Maybe they neglect the rest of their family and careers and lean into the circus.
Families, police, private investigators, even hoaxers begin to realize there’s media capital in the case.
“The Polish woman who believes she is Madeleine McCann has been dealt a devastating blow.” – NZ Herald (2023)
Periodically they put out feelers, a bid request. Or, media alert. They bait the hook by saying things like “New evidence has been found!” or “We have a new suspect!” or “A psychic has a lead!” or “AI digital image shows what lost 3yo girl would look like today..” or “It’s me! I am Madeline all grown up!” Now, in 2025, it’s even more vague than that but quite sufficient to move the cycle on its way again.
4. Media Pays Attention Again
Tabloids compete for exclusives. Money or attention is traded for interviews, photos, or new claims. Even false or flimsy leads are published if they “sell.”
Right now the Mainstream Media will be flashing money around in Portugal trying to get some pictures and “news” to go with this story. If anyone is willing to go on record and say something they can get paid.
Mr and Mrs McCann will know from previous experience that they’ve got an opportunity here to pick up free money. And, if they don’t let a new photo be taken of them for money then they’ll be followed around in the streets by paparazzi and have one taken of them without payment. They’ll be telling themselves it’s OK because they’re raising awareness and keeping the search alive and helping stop Portugal and Dingos from taking lives. Maybe they have some baby photos of little Madeline as yet unsold?
5. Cycle Fades… Until It Doesn’t
Public attention wanes, new stories come up. These ‘new’ stories will also be old ones. Another election. Another war. Another commodity (petrol, butter, coffee,..) price shock, another politician caught with his pants down,…
Eventually the story about a little girl lost will come up again and for now it’s McCann. This reminds me of Muslim tombs that have been tended by the same family for generations as gardeners, housekeepers, and tour guides. The memeplex of the ‘Lost Girl Tomb’ (an abstract one not a real place) is tended by the McCanns who took over from Lindy Chamberlain. This ‘tomb’ is not surrendered so much as snatched away just as James Frazer explains in the Ritual of the Dying King. Frazer retold the story of the Priest of Nemi who got his job by murdering his predecessor and holds his office until a successful assassin kills him and takes the job.
One day the McCann regency will be tapped out and hand over their ghoulish grave-tending to another white woman and her dead innocent. Kate McCann is the anchor because of her great hair, makeup, clothing, and photogenic facial features. Born in 1968 she’ll be 60 soon and unable to pull off the look of a grieving young mother. Like Annabel Langbein she has managed to keep her niche by tricking the camera into thinking she’s a generation or 2 younger than she appears. Must help to be a medical doctor and for husband Gerry to be the same. Besides, old photos of the couple can be recycled over and over which makes it seem like they don’t age and the news is fresh.
After the dust settles we’ll go back to 3 again. Another baiting of the hook, another circus. This is good for 25 years or so.
Eventually the McCanns will have to tap out and yield to a new and better story. The next Chamberlain/McCann is waiting to happen. Part of how it will happen is that Millennials and GenZ and GenAlphas will have forgotten, or never known, that they are caught in a great Media Feedback Loop. Older generations will have lived long enough to see this happen twice or more and might have legitimate cynicism about being fooled again. They will not be listened to. It’s a precondition of the next cycle that anyone who would have put a stop to this nonsense will have lost credibility.
Instead of, say, a GenX person standing up and giving a speech based on, say, the post you’re reading now, there will be nothing. Or, anyone who does stand up will be attacked for hating innocent little lost girls. Maybe they’ll even become a suspect. Some Polish woman in 2023 seems to have tried to get in on the McCann industry by claiming to be the lost girl and was promptly placed under arrest. She was a threat to the industry, after all.
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Image ref. Dan Kitwood, Getty Images. Country Living
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