In the ‘Tinder swindler’ ABC news article, written by journalists Zoe Lake and Lauren Effron, is a narrative that details how a Norwegian woman, Cecilie Fjellhoy, is defrauded out of $200K, from taking out loans to help her then-boyfriend Simon Leviev.
In this article, a question that first arises as a reader is: “how could a person be so gullible to give thousands of dollars to a person they met on an app?” – I see how one could immediately pass the blame on the victim from the headline alone.
This is where I feel the narrative is missing details, it needs further explanation behind the ruthlessness and skill of fraudster Simon Leviev, otherwise, the tone of this article could allude that Cecilie is a victim solely of her own doing, her own ignorance and naivety to trust a man she met on tinder – being the culprit of this crime.
In actuality, this man cunningly manipulated his romantic partners, he preyed on them. Another bias and undertone in this article is that Cecilie may have been attracted to Mr Leviev because of his wealthy lifestyle and chose to date him based on this false pretence. This would label Ms Fjellhoy an opportunist, when in fact, she gained nothing but debt from being with him.
I feel the narrative wouldn’t be as attention-grabbing for the media if it didn’t have an ‘opportunist gets scammed’ spin on it, or without its ‘how stupid could you be’ value. I feel ABC has chosen to include this spin on it without blatantly revealing it. This, causes a reader to arrive at a judgement without an in-depth understanding of the full narrative and the reality of how a con artist like Simon Leviev works.
Source:
https://abcnews.go.com/US/woman-man-met-tinder-swindled-200k-didnt-dump/story?id=62806053