US media cover events that happen in the United States and in the rest of the world, especially those taking place in far-away, non-industrialized countries, in a very distinct manner.
— Angry TP Roll (@AngryTPRoll) April 28, 2015
A Washington Post reporter wrote an article “How Western Media Would Cover Baltimore if It Happened Elsewhere,” brilliantly pinpointing the double-standards and racist nature of US media coverage during the protests in Baltimore. Karen Attiah, the author of the story, deliberately chose wording and logic used by US media companies when covering a story about protests in some distant nation to describe the Baltimore protests.
The author writes:
“Black Americans, a minority ethnic group, are killed by state security forces at a rate higher than the white majority population. Young, black American males are 21 times more likely to be shot by police than white American males.”
Readers quickly picked up on the satirical story, providing their own thoughts on the events in Baltimore. A person with the nickname “Hehelta” said:
“When few rebels were killed in Darfur in 2003 after attacking a military garrison, killed many officers in cold blood and burned landed aeroplanes, American media callled that Genocide. Clooney, Save Darfur and other self-made activists wept crocodile tears. Now they are mute. Isn’t that hypocritical Apartheid??”
The use of certain racialized terms, such as “thugs,” “criminals,” as well as the overuse of the words “violence” and “riot” are mostly reserved to instances when protesters are predominantly Black, such as in the Baltimore protesters. However, when rioters are White, media labels them as “fans” or “revelers”. A reader named Optimo, caught onto this paradox as well:
“But yet when (white) Ohio State students light cars on fire after a football game, nobody calls them “thugs” — interesting.”
It is clear that there is more going on in Baltimore than what we can see when reported by CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and others. Mainstream US media choose not to cover the whole story, deliberately leaving out the peaceful side of the Baltimore protests. Instead, all we can hear about is “Riots Erupt,” “Night of Unrest,” “Rage” and “The Worst Moment in America’s History”.
