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Hate to say it
Denver Rocky Mountain News ^ | February 17, 2006 | Vincent Carroll

Posted on 02/17/2006 1:34:30 PM PST by Graybeard58

The Boston Globe's Jeff Jacoby wrote an arresting column this week noting how reluctant so much of the news coverage has been to call the torching of 10 Baptist churches in Alabama an anti-Christian hate crime - or just a hate crime, period.

Imagine, Jacoby muses, that "unknown hoodlums had firebombed 10 gay bookstores and bars in San Francisco" or "10 Detroit-area mosques and halal restaurants." Not only would the burnings rocket to the front pages and remain there, politicians everywhere would be falling all over themselves to express solidarity with the victims.

The Alabama arsons haven't provoked anything like this level of public outrage, Jacoby notes. Indeed, "running through the coverage of the latest church burnings is an almost palpable yearning to cast the story in racial terms" - even though five of the churches were mostly white and five black.

As if to prove Jacoby's point, his own newspaper on the same day printed a lengthy article on the church burnings that was simply awash in racial angles. Readers learned, for example, that as "many white Alabamans cope with random attacks on their houses of worships, some in the most remote and segregated communities are experiencing an awakening (to racial sensitivity) that seems years overdue."

But give the Globe credit: About a third of the way into the 1,500-word article, the writer does manage to mention the words "hate crime." Once.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; US: Alabama
KEYWORDS: jacoby
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1 posted on 02/17/2006 1:34:31 PM PST by Graybeard58
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To: Graybeard58

There was a groundswell in the media when they realized the first few churches burned were black churches, but after the badguys burned about 5 white churches in a row you didn't hear another word about it.


2 posted on 02/17/2006 1:39:42 PM PST by JamesP81
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To: JamesP81

I wonder if the Boring Broadsheet would print cartoons of those responsible.


3 posted on 02/17/2006 1:41:42 PM PST by massgopguy (massgopguy)
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To: Graybeard58

"some in the most remote and segregated communities are experiencing an awakening (to racial sensitivity) that seems years overdue."

As a Southern boy, that is just hilarious. New England yanks have no idea how far ahead of them in race relations us backwards-assed Southerners are.


4 posted on 02/17/2006 1:43:03 PM PST by L98Fiero
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To: Graybeard58

"Hate crime", eh? As opposed to a "love crime", I suppose?


5 posted on 02/17/2006 1:43:13 PM PST by Past Your Eyes (If we're not going to learn from the past, what's the point of having one. -Peggy Hill)
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To: Graybeard58

It is impossible to commit a hate crime against a straight white Christian.


6 posted on 02/17/2006 1:43:33 PM PST by Navy Patriot (At times like this, it is a pleasure to support Free Republic.)
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To: L98Fiero

You want to see some real bigotry, go to Massachusetts.


7 posted on 02/17/2006 1:44:28 PM PST by Past Your Eyes (You new the job was dang'rous when you took it.)
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To: JamesP81

White Christians apparently are disposable...


8 posted on 02/17/2006 1:44:47 PM PST by mlc9852
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To: L98Fiero


We live it and we live it together very nicely.


9 posted on 02/17/2006 1:46:05 PM PST by onyx (IF ONLY 10% of Muslims are radical, that's still 120 MILLION who want to kill us.)
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To: Graybeard58

If one gay guy got beat up leaving a gay bar, there would be hate crimes stories in every newspaper.


10 posted on 02/17/2006 1:46:51 PM PST by Always Right
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To: Graybeard58
By coincidence, yesterday, a "Black" church was destroyed by fire outside of Bryan, Texas - the cause is still under investigation. It was covered by the local media, but I havent heard any mention/connection by the national media - not that I believe there is any connection.

Mt Zion Baptist Church Fire

11 posted on 02/17/2006 1:49:51 PM PST by texianyankee
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To: L98Fiero
"As a Southern boy, that is just hilarious. New England yanks have no idea how far ahead of them in race relations us backwards-assed Southerners are."

The blacks up there hate whites even more than they do down here?

12 posted on 02/17/2006 1:50:09 PM PST by Aznar5
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To: Graybeard58
The five black churches were hate crimes, the five white Churches were merely a protest against Christian intolerance. /sarcasm
13 posted on 02/17/2006 1:50:29 PM PST by HEY4QDEMS (Learn from the past, don't live in it.)
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To: Graybeard58
Imagine, Jacoby muses, that "unknown hoodlums had firebombed 10 gay bookstores and bars in San Francisco" or "10 Detroit-area mosques and halal restaurants." Not only would the burnings rocket to the front pages and remain there, politicians everywhere would be falling all over themselves to express solidarity with the victims.

And there'd be candlelight vigils in every major city, liberal columnists/pundits lambasting the "hate-filled right-wing," and congress drafting updated "hate crime" legislation.

As it is, news of the 10 burned churches is lucky to make it to page 25A.

14 posted on 02/17/2006 1:52:11 PM PST by Mr. Mojo
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To: L98Fiero

Man, you've got that right on race here in the South!

Now, I think the reason that the press doesn't want to cover this is that they think there's a good chance that the arsonists will turn out to be "militant queers".


15 posted on 02/17/2006 1:52:57 PM PST by Emmett McCarthy
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To: Emmett McCarthy
Well not to worry PIAPS will make it a campain issue in '08 when she will mezmorise the audience with her childhood recollections of church burnings and lynchings in her neighborhood when she was growing up.

The fact that she grew up in a lily white neighborhood will somehow escape the otherwise rabid newshounds assigned to cover her campain.

16 posted on 02/17/2006 1:58:19 PM PST by marlon
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To: Emmett McCarthy

As usual, Jacoby is right on. A few of the churches were black. If they all were, I'm sure you would see a different type of coverage.


17 posted on 02/17/2006 1:59:39 PM PST by BW2221
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To: Graybeard58

Wow, when Jeff Jacoby and El Globo point out the irony that is really telling. If half as many mosques were burned there would be riots and politicians racing to the cameras.


18 posted on 02/17/2006 2:05:22 PM PST by Bluestateredman
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To: Bluestateredman

"militant queers"?

No, I'm almost certain it was the "Flaming Homosexuals".


19 posted on 02/17/2006 2:17:12 PM PST by CowboyJay (Rough Riders! Tancredo '08)
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To: Graybeard58

The lack of hystrionics in the MSM over these church burnings is notable.


20 posted on 02/17/2006 2:17:31 PM PST by TexanToTheCore (Rock the pews, Baby)
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