Posted on 09/25/2007 12:23:31 AM PDT by freedomdefender
One of The Bee's most controversial practices for several years has been when and how the paper identifies the race of suspects in crime stories.
The paper has set a high standard, allowing the use of race only when it is accompanied by a detailed physical description or when reporting a serial crime or when using police sketches of suspects.
The bar was set high to avoid racial stereotyping caused by vague or unreliable racial descriptions provided by police, crime victims or witnesses.
Not surprisingly, critics through the years have accused the paper of political correctness, and the issue's volatility has ebbed and flowed, sometimes lying dormant for months only to arise anew in the wake of a particularly heinous crime.
It's burning white-hot now in the aftermath of the slaying in Sacramento of a young father and his 7-month-old son and the paper's reluctance until several days had passed to provide racial descriptions of the suspects.
Now, the paper's policy is under review, according to Executive Editor Rick Rodriguez, who is leaning toward modifying the policy to allow the use of race as part of a general description of suspects. ...
I would like to hear your thoughts about this via an online chat. To participate, please go to www.sacbee.com/public and I will post your questions and observations....
You can contact the Public Editor by mail at P.O. Box 15779, Sacramento, CA 95852; by e-mail at publiceditor@sacbee.com; or by calling him directly at (916) 321-1250.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
The good news is, these liberal censors at newspapers -McClatchy in particular - are dinosaurs, about to gasp their last breath. McClatchy is losing money big-time. Well deserved.
I shouldn’t say McClatchy is losing money. Their profits are down. That’s what I meant to say.
ping
As a side note, one nice thing about Sacramento is that you can access a website that maps crime locations. You can find out where the crime clusters are for burglaries, etc. It would be nice if this were done by all states and cities.
Why even claim that a human being did it? That’s anthrocentric. The actual news is that a person was stabbed repeatedly, cut into little bits, packed into plastic bags and buried next to a river. Maybe snakes did it. :)
bttt
These idiots don’t care that by not mentioning the race of suspects who are still at large, they’re endangering the lives of innocent people of ALL races.
I agree that they’re only considering changing the policy because they’re in decline. The only reason CNN hired Glenn Beck and allows Lou Dobbs to make sense is because they need them to compete with FOX.
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