A great small article highlighting the fact that how mainstream news media selects what to show on their channels, & how their anchors choose words to frame a certain section of population & their activities as illegal or dangerous. But when that same section of population tries to achieve their goals through peaceful & non-violent means, those news media are nowhere to be found.
Everyone is ready to quote Gandhi & gave examples of his non-violent struggles (if you read the uncensored history of freedom of Indian subcontinent from Britain, you'd realize that it was not non-violent & it involved a lot more people than just Gandhi) but forget that non-violence achieved nothing & won't achieve anything even more now, since the corporate news media is all about ratings & the general populace has been desensitized to the point that they won't focus on a news until chaos & anarchy is being televised.
Did the non-violent struggles of Dr. Martin Luther King achieved his dream of equality & justice for all, regardless of their skin colour? Did Nelson Mandela's non-violent struggles of freeing South Africa & building an equal & just society in South Africa has come to fruition? What about Dalai Lama's non-violent struggles or Aung San Suu-Kyi's for Myanmar? None of them achieved their dream to the full extent.
They / their population were / are still struggling for those rights; be it African-Americans, or Black South Africans, or Buddhists of Tibet, or full & transparent democracy in Myanmar (that military junta only opened the country & accepted a semblance of democracy so foreign investors pour money in the country & the military elite further increase their wealth).
Problem is that the root problems of all these struggles are not hard to find & they are pretty openly laid out by campaigners, activists, & community & political organizations, but the political & corporate elites don't want to resolve those issues. Unlike other minorities in US, African-Americans have been living in US for more than a couple centuries, but they are still considered second-class citizens & they are discriminated against, heavily. Sometimes, it feels like that my ethnic minority, South Asian, are relatively treated better than African-Americans.
These protests all over US are not the result of one person's death. These protests are the result of decades of frustration & anger towards the discrimination African-Americans face on a daily basis.
P.S., a great documentary to see how corporate world controls the American media is, "Shadows of Liberty."
Disclaimer: Of course, I am not condoning such acts of destruction or violence for someone to get their point across, but it is completely understandable why it is happening, & until & unless, the governments, at all levels, engage with the population, instead of merely deploying the police force, & work with the communities to eradicate injustice & inequality, these acts of destruction & violent protests will become more prevalent in the American society.
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The mainstream US media are facing criticism over their coverage of unrest in Baltimore. Activists & residents claim the media ignored peaceful marches, focused on labels & violence, & ignored the chronic issues of poverty & police misconduct.
Protesters shouted down Fox News’ Geraldo Rivera, who arrived in Baltimore shortly before the curfew on Tuesday. They blocked his camera and accused Fox News of lying & “false coverage.”
Fox & other networks were accused of ignoring the peaceful marches & gatherings that were previously protesting the death of Baltimore resident Freddie Gray in police custody.
“When we were out here protesting all last week for 6 days straight peacefully, there were no news cameras, there were no helicopters, there was no riot gear, & nobody heard us,” protester Danielle Williams told MSNBC's Thomas Roberts on Tuesday. “So now that we've burned down buildings & set businesses on fire & looted buildings, now all of the sudden everybody wants to hear us.”
Fox News host Shepard Smith, speaking on “The Five,” also pointed out that the media has ignored Baltimore’s chronic issues, including the Gray affair.
“We’ve got a major American city that has decades – decades – of turmoil within this neighborhood,” Smith said. “One quarter of the youth locked up. Clearly there is a big problem. Then all of a sudden, an African-American man is taken into a vehicle, & he comes out of it and dies – & you get nothing from authorities except a suspension. And those who would do harm take an opportunity to do harm. And here we are.”
City Councilman Carl Stokes was exasperated by CNN host Erin Burnett’s use of the word.
“No, it’s not the right word to call our children ‘thugs,’” Stokes said. “These are children who have been set aside, marginalized, who have not been engaged by us.”
Comedy host Jon Stewart also took issue with the media coverage of Baltimore unrest, singling out CNN’s Wolf Blitzer’s statement that Monday’s imagery was “hard to believe.”
“Elvis leading a herd of orthodox Jewish unicorns through a city street – that would be hard to believe,” Stewart chided Blitzer in Tuesday’s edition of The Daily Show. “Ferguson was just a few months ago, & you were talking about it.”
“Maybe a more nuanced alert system could allow for more productive intervention beyond, ‘You have 10 seconds to disperse,’” Stewart argued. “Or we could agree to keep ignoring the roots of how systemically, historically disenfranchised many African-American communities still are, only paying attention to them when their periodic fiery ball of anger threatens to enter our airspace like some kind of Alex Haley’s comet. And once again breathing a blissful sigh of forgetful relief when it’s another near-miss.”
Everyone is ready to quote Gandhi & gave examples of his non-violent struggles (if you read the uncensored history of freedom of Indian subcontinent from Britain, you'd realize that it was not non-violent & it involved a lot more people than just Gandhi) but forget that non-violence achieved nothing & won't achieve anything even more now, since the corporate news media is all about ratings & the general populace has been desensitized to the point that they won't focus on a news until chaos & anarchy is being televised.
Did the non-violent struggles of Dr. Martin Luther King achieved his dream of equality & justice for all, regardless of their skin colour? Did Nelson Mandela's non-violent struggles of freeing South Africa & building an equal & just society in South Africa has come to fruition? What about Dalai Lama's non-violent struggles or Aung San Suu-Kyi's for Myanmar? None of them achieved their dream to the full extent.
They / their population were / are still struggling for those rights; be it African-Americans, or Black South Africans, or Buddhists of Tibet, or full & transparent democracy in Myanmar (that military junta only opened the country & accepted a semblance of democracy so foreign investors pour money in the country & the military elite further increase their wealth).
Problem is that the root problems of all these struggles are not hard to find & they are pretty openly laid out by campaigners, activists, & community & political organizations, but the political & corporate elites don't want to resolve those issues. Unlike other minorities in US, African-Americans have been living in US for more than a couple centuries, but they are still considered second-class citizens & they are discriminated against, heavily. Sometimes, it feels like that my ethnic minority, South Asian, are relatively treated better than African-Americans.
These protests all over US are not the result of one person's death. These protests are the result of decades of frustration & anger towards the discrimination African-Americans face on a daily basis.
P.S., a great documentary to see how corporate world controls the American media is, "Shadows of Liberty."
Disclaimer: Of course, I am not condoning such acts of destruction or violence for someone to get their point across, but it is completely understandable why it is happening, & until & unless, the governments, at all levels, engage with the population, instead of merely deploying the police force, & work with the communities to eradicate injustice & inequality, these acts of destruction & violent protests will become more prevalent in the American society.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The mainstream US media are facing criticism over their coverage of unrest in Baltimore. Activists & residents claim the media ignored peaceful marches, focused on labels & violence, & ignored the chronic issues of poverty & police misconduct.
Protesters shouted down Fox News’ Geraldo Rivera, who arrived in Baltimore shortly before the curfew on Tuesday. They blocked his camera and accused Fox News of lying & “false coverage.”
Fox & other networks were accused of ignoring the peaceful marches & gatherings that were previously protesting the death of Baltimore resident Freddie Gray in police custody.
“When we were out here protesting all last week for 6 days straight peacefully, there were no news cameras, there were no helicopters, there was no riot gear, & nobody heard us,” protester Danielle Williams told MSNBC's Thomas Roberts on Tuesday. “So now that we've burned down buildings & set businesses on fire & looted buildings, now all of the sudden everybody wants to hear us.”
Fox News host Shepard Smith, speaking on “The Five,” also pointed out that the media has ignored Baltimore’s chronic issues, including the Gray affair.
“We’ve got a major American city that has decades – decades – of turmoil within this neighborhood,” Smith said. “One quarter of the youth locked up. Clearly there is a big problem. Then all of a sudden, an African-American man is taken into a vehicle, & he comes out of it and dies – & you get nothing from authorities except a suspension. And those who would do harm take an opportunity to do harm. And here we are.”
City Councilman Carl Stokes was exasperated by CNN host Erin Burnett’s use of the word.
“No, it’s not the right word to call our children ‘thugs,’” Stokes said. “These are children who have been set aside, marginalized, who have not been engaged by us.”
Comedy host Jon Stewart also took issue with the media coverage of Baltimore unrest, singling out CNN’s Wolf Blitzer’s statement that Monday’s imagery was “hard to believe.”
“Elvis leading a herd of orthodox Jewish unicorns through a city street – that would be hard to believe,” Stewart chided Blitzer in Tuesday’s edition of The Daily Show. “Ferguson was just a few months ago, & you were talking about it.”
“Maybe a more nuanced alert system could allow for more productive intervention beyond, ‘You have 10 seconds to disperse,’” Stewart argued. “Or we could agree to keep ignoring the roots of how systemically, historically disenfranchised many African-American communities still are, only paying attention to them when their periodic fiery ball of anger threatens to enter our airspace like some kind of Alex Haley’s comet. And once again breathing a blissful sigh of forgetful relief when it’s another near-miss.”
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