Black Radicalism in the Media

Journalism has a responsibility to provide accurate information that shines a light on an issue that is poorly understood or ignored. One issue that would benefit from a more thorough fact checking on the media’s behalf is the plethora of police brutality within the United States. Black Lives Matter and black people’s response to the loss of innocent black lives at the hands of police has received tons of negative backlash within the media. 

The biggest problem the media has with police brutality cases is with race discrimination.

It is very clear that the media treats white suspects and killers better than black victims. For example, “Theatre Shooting Suspect (white) was Brilliant Science Student”. Meanwhile, “Montgomery’s latest homicide victim (black) had history of narcotics abuse, tangles with the law”. Also, “Son in Staten Island murders was brilliant, athletic—but his demons were the death of parents”. Whereas, “Trayvon Martin was suspended three times from school”. They make the white suspects look innocent or blame their actions on apparent mental illness, but mental illness is not interchangeable with racism.

The media reinforces positive pictures of white suspects, such as a graduation picture, but when discussing black victims, the media exposes previous mugshots or a picture of the victim appearing angered.

News reporting is to be without bias.

There were plenty of movements that came about in 2018. There were the anti-gun violence protests such as #NeverAgain which was formed by the survivors of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting on February 14. That was then followed by the “Enough!” national school walkout in early March, then the March for Our Lives demonstration in late March in Washington, DC, and another national school walkout in late April. This movement spent several months in the media and it was never made to seem that the students leading the movement were aggressors. They had overall support.

In order to keep the media and news broadcasters from being the only sources, social activists have been progressing with several hashtags. Outside of #BlackLivesMatter, several hashtags include, #MeToo, #NoBanNoWall, #MuslimBan, #DACA, and #TimesUp.

There have several thousands of Black Lives Matter demonstrations held across the United States, including Ferguson, Chicago, Detroit, and Washington D.C. The protests have since gone far beyond the United States into the likes of Canada and the United Kingdom. 

Though large-scale protests existed throughout 2017-2019, they often went unreported nationally.

If protests were reported, the focus of the story was shifted. News organizations that mentioned “Black Lives Matter”, did not focus on the loss of life, but rather the looting and rioting that followed the protests and was incited by parties who had nothing to do with the movement.

An article stated that in "response to acts of violence and vandalism committed by apparent supporters of the movement," accusing Black Lives Matter of "anti-white and anti-police radicalism." When in reality the group is simply taking a stand for black people, which has rarely ever been done before.