General Discussion
Showing Original Post only (View all)We see regular, often harsh criticism of the media for their decisions on what and who to cover [View all]
We see criticism of their editorial choices, whom they choose to cover (how tired are we of having to listen to Trump voters babbling in diners and Republican House Members babbling on talk shows, etc.?), how much coverage we give them, whom they are not covering, etc. With few exceptions, that criticism is accepted with complete agreement and very little, if any pushback by people defending their editorial choices or making excuses for them.
So it's been very surprising and odd that the recent criticism of the media's tendency to provide saturation coverage of young, attractive white women who go missing and/or are murdered while giving virtually no attention to Black and brown women who face the same tragic fate, has been met with such vigorous and sometimes hostile and accusatory defenses that we've seen in the past couple of days.
I think this is the first instance in which I've seen folks circle their wagons around the media against allies who are simply pointing out the obvious - that a media we all recognize as deeply flawed and biased in many different ways sometimes allows racial bias to affect its coverage, just as its other biases do.
Not sure why it's fine to go after the press for their other biases that affect what they cover and how they cover it, but discussing how racial bias impacts their coverage - or even mentioning that one of those biases is racial - triggers such a defensive reaction.
Something to think about.