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EffieBlack

(14,249 posts)
Tue Jan 22, 2019, 10:46 PM Jan 2019

"White-Washing White Supremacy: Media Rushes to Excuse Covington Catholic Students"

In another incidence of white-washing white supremacy, white journalists are rushing to excuse a clearly racist incident involving white teens from Covington Catholic school in Kentucky, in part by discounting the testimony of a Native elder and former U.S. Marine.

Every single day across America, women seeking abortion and other forms of reproductive health care have to run a gauntlet of intimidation just to enter health clinics. Protesters, self-anointed street “counselors,” and religious fundamentalists bring gory signs and scream, often using high-decibel amplification equipment. They harangue and harass patients and staff, calling them “baby-killers” and promising them damnation. Clinic protesters feel righteous in their actions because they believe they are morally superior to the people seeking care, and they believe they have a right to impose their will on others. These and other tactics of intimidation are an integral part of the misogynistic, patriarchal arsenal of the “pro-life” movement, which every year in January hosts a “March for Life.” And every year, the march organizers bus students in from parochial schools across the country to ensure someone actually shows up. This year, they brought students from Covington Catholic High School in Kentucky.
...
In a now widely republished video, students from Covington Catholic, an all-male, virtually all-white, elite private school, taunted and mocked Nathan Phillips, a Native elder from the Omaha Nation and former U.S. Marine. Phillips was in D.C.—which like much of the United States is land from which indigenous peoples were forcibly removed—to attend the first Indigenous People’s March, a gathering of prayers, songs, dances, and speeches, calling attention to the global injustices perpetuated against indigenous peoples. While trying to intercede in what he believed to be an escalating situation between a large and increasingly rowdy group of at least 60 white teen boys and five Black men, he walked between the two groups, drumming in an effort to defuse the rising tension. Phillips then came face to face with Nick Sandmann, the young man who became an instant and iconic image of white entitlement exhibited by him and his classmates.

What happened next is telling: In short, Phillips’ testimony about an incident in which a very large group of raucous boys surrounded him and acted with extreme disrespect is being ignored in favor of an after-the-fact narrative created by white teens from a virtually all-white school with a history of blatant and public racism. The boys’ narrative also is being amplified by white journalists, further disrespecting the Native elder and discounting the accounts of eyewitnesses at the scene. This discounting of experience is familiar to many of us: the women who seek reproductive health care who are effectively told we should endure abuse, the Native elder on sacred ground being made the “aggressor” as the only adult who tries to intervene in a situation, the people of color who constantly have largely male, majority-white media telling them “there’s more to the story” of their abuse than what they say. It’s the same story, different characters that we saw played out just recently in the U.S. Supreme Court hearings of Brett Kavanaugh, who also attended an elite Catholic school and whose alleged actions many defended as an example of “boys being boys.” White boys, of course.

The entire incident reads like the script of a remake we’ve seen too many times before. The initial video showing a large group of boys being aggressive and disrespectful to Phillips exploded across the internet and drew outrage. Then, new videos purporting to show “other perspectives” (including helpful offers by #MAGA followers on Twitter to send me their “spliced videos” showing the “true picture”) were circulated. This was followed by a letter ascribed to Sandmann that effectively blamed Phillips for the entire incident, stating: “He waded into the crowd, which parted for him. I [Sandmann] did not see anyone try to block his path. He locked eyes with me and approached me, coming within inches of my face. He played his drum the entire time he was in my face.”

The letter was disseminated by RunSwitch, a Kentucky-based PR firm. One of the three founding partners of RunSwitch is Scott Jennings, a conservative commentator, and a former political operative who worked for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, George W. Bush, and other Republican politicians ... But all it took was the mournful letter written by a right-wing PR firm to change the situation. Almost immediately after “the other side” letter was released, the white-washing began. White journalists across the internet paused for a collective white sympathy moment, writing mea culpas at having “misread the situation.”
https://rewire.news/article/2019/01/22/white-washing-white-supremacy-media-rushes-to-excuse-covington-catholic-students/?fbclid=IwAR2u4lw2qmncdTJ0JNw96sSa7EfS2-cz7qh5cxS4OK-T8idup5HvdF7Mbd0
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"White-Washing White Supremacy: Media Rushes to Excuse Covington Catholic Students" (Original Post) EffieBlack Jan 2019 OP
. . . CousinIT Jan 2019 #1
WOW! That's a perfect strip for this Gaslit Shit. Cha Jan 2019 #13
+1 dalton99a Jan 2019 #16
It's troubling. liberalmuse Jan 2019 #2
It's particularly bizarre to see Democrats on DU engage in this EffieBlack Jan 2019 #5
Yep. nt SunSeeker Jan 2019 #10
I know I don't need to say it again at the DU, but musette_sf Jan 2019 #3
Wearing their Stupid Freaking, Racist, MAGAt Cha Jan 2019 #14
There is a definite whitewashing going on. Baitball Blogger Jan 2019 #4
It doesn't surprised me that Nathan is being smeared MustLoveBeagles Jan 2019 #6
Today on Democracy Now: Nathan Phillips stated the following... RestoreAmerica2020 Jan 2019 #9
Thanks for the link MustLoveBeagles Jan 2019 #21
Funny, innit, that Missing Mitch's PR flack is flacking for these shitbird brats. Stinky The Clown Jan 2019 #7
And, the "media" is gaslighting this shite. Cha Jan 2019 #12
I betcha Savannah Guthrie will whitewash it tomorrow too. LiberalFighter Jan 2019 #8
Both ABC and CBS news were kissing the little elite punks butts tonight. nt elmac Jan 2019 #11
and look at what is being normalized KT2000 Jan 2019 #15
The OP is by Jodi Jacobson, author of: "Franken Must Take Responsibility or Resign" oberliner Jan 2019 #17
She's wrong how? uponit7771 Jan 2019 #18
Because she's talking about racism in a way that doesn't make excuses for white people or EffieBlack Jan 2019 #19
+1, yep and some people are going through threads posting obvious Red Herrings and wont be uponit7771 Jan 2019 #20

liberalmuse

(18,670 posts)
2. It's troubling.
Tue Jan 22, 2019, 11:12 PM
Jan 2019

I know exactly what I'm seeing when I look at all the videos, but there are some people who were convinced by a major PR propaganda and troll push online what they were supposed to see, including liberals. They infiltrated liberal comments sections (they were all over the comments on DU) and narrated the story the way they wanted it to go over and over again, and it worked!

In less than 24 hours, news stations, blogs and progressive Tweeters started apologizing and some are even standing up for the kid who got in Nathan Phillip's face. The conservatives have been doing this for years, and it's been getting progressively worse, but I've honestly never seen it to this extent. Conservatives saw how well this worked and we are going to get seriously overwhelmed with bullshit. Time to break out "1984" again.

 

EffieBlack

(14,249 posts)
5. It's particularly bizarre to see Democrats on DU engage in this
Tue Jan 22, 2019, 11:57 PM
Jan 2019

I'm not surprised by the usual suspects who always troll these issues. But plenty of well-meaning and heretofore more discerning posters have fallen for this trick.

SMH

musette_sf

(10,184 posts)
3. I know I don't need to say it again at the DU, but
Tue Jan 22, 2019, 11:24 PM
Jan 2019

these punks specifically went to DC to participate in a hate march advocating the erasure of innocent citizens' rights.

From here, it looks like Went to a Hate March -> Did Some Side Hatin' Too

Baitball Blogger

(46,576 posts)
4. There is a definite whitewashing going on.
Tue Jan 22, 2019, 11:29 PM
Jan 2019

And Nathan Phillip's name is getting dragged through the mud. Many of my conservative friends think the boys are vindicated, spreading links to articles that claim that Twitter canceled the account that started the controversy by posting the first video and that Nathan Phillips disrupted a mass at the Basilica.

Do a search for for the Twitter cancellation and you'll find several links where blog sites are apologizing to the boys. I think someone is tampering with the google searches, trying to slant the verdict on this issue.

MustLoveBeagles

(11,563 posts)
6. It doesn't surprised me that Nathan is being smeared
Wed Jan 23, 2019, 12:15 AM
Jan 2019

He put himself at risk to try and calm that situation. I can't imagine how he feels now. No good deed goes unpunished.

KT2000

(20,544 posts)
15. and look at what is being normalized
Wed Jan 23, 2019, 02:07 AM
Jan 2019

racist behavior for all to see - nothing hidden about it.
Before tRump this would have been shown as an aberration, as in we are not like this (though not honestly).
Now with just the $$ for a PR firm, this is what America is about - these assholes are put upon patriots.
This is really the bottom of the barrel.

 

oberliner

(58,724 posts)
17. The OP is by Jodi Jacobson, author of: "Franken Must Take Responsibility or Resign"
Wed Jan 23, 2019, 03:35 AM
Jan 2019

Excerpt:

Over the past several weeks, however, reports have surfaced of Franken variously acting gauche and like a frat boy, touching women inappropriately, and kissing women without consent. Virtually all of these are years old, but that really is not the point. It is offensive and disgusting behavior.

Today, however, two more women have come forward to report inappropriate touching on Franken’s part. One or two reports of a hand in the wrong place among the “thousands of photos” Franken took as a candidate and now does as a senator is one thing. But the growing number of reports—six to date—reveals we have now gone from a possible incident to a pattern.

https://rewire.news/article/2017/11/30/franken-must-take-responsibility-resign/
 

EffieBlack

(14,249 posts)
19. Because she's talking about racism in a way that doesn't make excuses for white people or
Wed Jan 23, 2019, 09:19 AM
Jan 2019

blame it on black people.

Don't you love how, instead of reading and thinking about what people have to say, some folks will go through the trouble of doing background checks on the people who say things that jiggle their sense of how the world should be?

uponit7771

(90,225 posts)
20. +1, yep and some people are going through threads posting obvious Red Herrings and wont be
Wed Jan 23, 2019, 12:23 PM
Jan 2019

... honest about

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