Posted on 10/23/2007 10:58:14 PM PDT by RWR8189
By now, almost everyone in America has heard of Jena, La., because they've all heard the story of the "Jena 6." White students hanging nooses barely punished, a schoolyard fight, excessive punishment for the six black attackers, racist local officials, public outrage and protests – the outside media made sure everyone knew the basics.
There's just one problem: The media got most of the basics wrong. In fact, I have never before witnessed such a disgrace in professional journalism. Myths replaced facts, and journalists abdicated their solemn duty to investigate every claim because they were seduced by a powerfully appealing but false narrative of racial injustice.
I should know. I live in Jena. My wife has taught at Jena High School for many years. And most important, I am probably the only reporter who has covered these events from the very beginning.
The reason the Jena cases have been propelled into the world spotlight is two-fold: First, because local officials did not speak publicly early on about the true events of the past year, the media simply formed their stories based on one-side's statements – the Jena 6. Second, the media were downright lazy in their efforts to find the truth. Often, they simply reported what they'd read on blogs, which expressed only one side of the issue.
The real story of Jena and the Jena 6 is quite different from what the national media presented. It's time to set the record straight.
Myth 1: The Whites-Only Tree. There has never been a "whites-only" tree at Jena High School. Students of all races sat underneath this tree. When a student asked during an assembly at the start of school last year if anyone could sit under the tree, it evoked laughter from everyone present – blacks and whites. As
(Excerpt) Read more at csmonitor.com ...
Imagine that. The MSM and race baitors working in concert to get a story peversely wrong
Wrong. The reason the media told the Jena 6 lies is that they seek to undermine American unity and self-confidence in order to bring about socialistic world government.
What bothers me is how many posters on this forum trashed the white students and essentially gave a pass to the Jena 6.
The white students were supposed to be racists, and the Jena 6 were just racting.
Strangely even the Jena 6 didn’t blame the violent attack on the nooses until after the media got involved. First statements from them after the attack didn’t mention the nooses at all.
Are we able to print the whole story from the Shristian Science Monitor? Or only paragraphs and summaries?
But lets all not forget. This is not the medias fault. They are blameless.
POTUS Bush should have put together a state run information organization to broadcast the real truth to us poor misguided citizens.
That worked so well for the soviets, after all.
Its not the medias fault.
Thank you for posting this. I confess to not following this very closely. It’s a little hard for me to believe that the high schoolers who hung the nooses weren’t at all aware of the symbolism of nooses in the South, though. (Be easy on me, I’m a northern gal, and someone who is old enough to have gone to public school when they actually taught you something.)
Yes, the media is treated so unfairly in the U.S. We damand the full truth, unlike the readers of the heroic press of the former USSR.
This makes me ill. The MSM is sick. Those first boys got too much punishment for their prank with the ropes. Good grief. No wonder kids are growing up with so many mental problems the school system and the adults are driving them crazy.
I believe it. Many kids today do not even realize what racism was to a great extent. I grew up in the 1960’s in Arkansas of all places and never saw racism. Hard to believe I know. But small towns were and still are that way. We knew each other too much to be hateful.
Truth has never been a big concern for the media. In the mid-70’s, my husband got out of the military and went back to school in Arkansas. We lived in an unusual corridor, where we could hear the pure news alerts from the AP & UPI before they made the evening news. I was shocked at the story on the TV, having heard the unedited stories earlier in the day. That was in the 70’s when it probably was closer to the truth than what we get today. It is easy to become a conspiracy nut when you see stuff like this, but I feel the conspiracy is not the government trying to regulate the news...it seems more the news companies want to manipulate the news.
not that he tried very hard or anything. This is just par for the course.
CSM is on the excerpt only list.
Wait a minute, the MSM got the story wrong? Next you’ll tell me we aren’t losing in Iraq!
The rope in the tree had nothing to do with blacks, nor was it directed toward them, the "tree in question wasn't even a "white only tree", and until the race baiters showed up, people got along fine in that school and town.
The white kid simply got jumped, and the race baiters turned it into a racial issue.
See how racism is created where it doesn't exist by the media and black leaders in this country? I've always noticed that no matter what, if there are black and white people talking about something, like on a talk show, etc. It's always the black person that makes a "black and white" comment. Every single time, no matter what the conversation. Just watch the view. every single show, Woopie or the otherone always brings up something against "whitey" or about whitey. They always have to bring up skin color no matter what.
Same here. Racism is something I learned along the way from those who claim to be it’s victims. THEY are the racists. Always blaming anyone with white skin for their problems. It doesn’t matter who you are or where your from. If your white, it’s you’re fault.
Couldn’t a small municipality file some actions against the media along the lines of insighting to riot, defamation or some such? This would be a great case to use as a platform to slap down the media. The white boys could sign on to the case and would certainly have standing due to the slander the press aired against them. The school, the local DA and other agencies might also jump on board.
I guess this is grasping at straws but I’d love to see the media get bitch slapped so hard it would knock them into the next decade.
thanks, bfl
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