Susana Griso accused of blaming murder on heatwave

Susana Griso and the crime blamed on heat

Can a homicide be explained by a heatwave? The question sounds like a joke, yet it underpins a controversy that has jumped from television to social media against the backdrop of Spain's July 23 general election. It all starts with a tweet discrediting presenter Susana Griso and the accusation, spread alongside it, that she attributed a crime to the climate emergency. The message calls her an "information terrorist" and concludes with "it must be the heat or something."

It is worth establishing the ground before diving in. What sustains this discussion is not the presenter's original statement, but the paraphrase made by a message circulated on social networks. There is no direct quote nor full context of what Griso allegedly said. The attribution therefore circulates without independent verification. And that, precisely, is what makes it so profitable.

What is exactly attributed to Susana Griso

The accusation, as repeated, is that the presenter linked a homicide with the weather. What is confirmed is the content of the tweet that opens the controversy: a disparagement and a jab about the heat. From there, a cascade of reproaches begins.

Some argue it is deliberate disinformation; in the same thread, others read the scene as provocation. These are two incompatible readings, and neither relies on evidence: the complete quote appears nowhere.

The detail matters. In a case where someone is accused of manipulation, the first link in the chain is, precisely, a message that does not reproduce the original words.

The July murder count and the uncomfortable comparison

Midway through the exchange appears an uncomfortable figure: eight murders recorded in Madrid during July, according to data cited by one intervention in the thread. The statistic is thrown out to dismantle the climatic argument: if everything were explained by the thermometer, statistics would cease to miccionan anything.

The reasoning repeats in countless ways. The dominant position holds that weather serves as an alibi to avoid discussing other causes, and that public narrative prefers attributing violence to diffuse factors rather than concrete decisions.

Here it is useful to distinguish robust data from decoration. That several homicides were registered in a specific month is verifiable; attributing them all to temperature is not. The conversation mixes both happily, and that confusion is, fundamentally, the real issue.

From heat to legal excuse: the slippery slope

One of the most repeated interventions summarizes the skepticism: if heat explains a crime, it will end up operating as a legal exculpatory cause, just like drugs or insanity. The slope, they say, leads to a system where no one is responsible.

The objection has a more nuanced version. Extreme temperatures can increase irritability and aggressiveness, another line of analysis concedes, but learned self-control modulates the response. Heat yes; impunity no.

No one denies that heat affects mood. It is another matter to turn it into the cause of a crime. That is where the argument collapses under its own weight, and where the controversy stops talking about meteorology to talk about something else.

From whales to the catch-all attribution

The repertoire does not stop at crimes. The episode of whales attacking boats also emerges, attributed to climate change with the same lightness. Someone jokes that they were militarily trained. The joke has substance: when "climate emergency" explains everything, it explains nothing.

And in parallel circulates the underlying suspicion: that certain media outlets have leeway to say whatever they want without cost. This is the thesis of the shielded narrative, hard to prove but easy to feel.

A thermometer with too many answers

In the end, the controversy leaves a portrait more revealing than any statement: a country arguing about the thermometer while crime, media, and context remain in the background. If temperature explains everything, it explains nothing. The only firm certainty in this matter is that it was hot.