A 9-year-old reporter who broke the news about a local homicide has hit back at her critics.
Hilde Kate Lysiak of Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania posted a story on her website about a local murder.
But while she received congratulations from some for breaking her first story at such a young age, others criticized the Orange Street News publisher.
Messages left for Hilde included the following:
“Sensationalist trash.”
“I am disgusted that this cute little girl thinks she’s a real journalist. What happened to tea parties?”
“9-year-old girls should be playing with dolls, not trying to be reporters.”
Lysiak posted a video response to her detractors, bragging that she beat her “adult competitors” by hours.
“If you want me to stop covering news, then you get off your computer and start doing something about the news,” she said.
“Is that cute enough for you?”
Anyone in America wanting to subscribe to the girl’s media outlet are told on her website that it costs $14.99 for 12 issues.
Hilde’s dad, who took his daughter to work sometimes when he worked as a journalist, said people thought his daughter’s previous stories were good.
“She was embraced when she was doing cuter stories, but about six months into writing the paper she got more confident and started stepping outside the box,” he told the Associated Press.
But people still questioned whether the girl is too young. One of those is Anne Carter, a nurse in Selisgrove.
“I think she’s very talented and her aspirations are great, but it’s probably a bigger case than a 9-year-old should handle,” Carter said. “Adults in the community are having trouble wrapping their heads around what happened. I can’t imagine how a 9-year-old can cover a story like that.”
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