Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) has some advice on media relations after the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton. Both incidents are brutal. El Paso is being politicized to the extreme because the shooter was some loser who wrote an anti-immigration manifesto, had ties to eco-terrorism, and criticized Republicans. And yet Trump is being blamed because…anti-immigration views never existed until Trump was elected president. That’s what’s being dished out here. I can’t roll my eyes demanding enough at these clowns. The Dayton shooter’s political views are being panned because he was a leftist who supported Elizabeth Warren and gun control.
Well, AOC offered this tidbit that should be common sense, but also something that should send CNN to the bunker. The New York Democrat said newsrooms should stop inviting neo-Nazis to their shows. At that point, CNN ran for the hills (via Washington Examiner):
If I were a journalist or worked in news, this is what I would do:
1. Interview real white supremacist experts and give them space (2+ minutes or lines) to educate the public on WS, what to look for. Often.
2. Do not present white supremacy and racism as a “conflict” or “debate”… /1
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) August 5, 2019
The reason there is a tendency on TV to have “both sides” on every issue is because the medium is motivated by conflict, so people will put the least qualified people on TV to create it (see: climate deniers). Don’t ask “whether [blank] racist?” Let the experts explain what to do about racism.
/2
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) August 5, 2019
3. Don’t let neo-Nazis on TV burnish their image or hide their racism in “reasonable” terms/appearance! It sounds obvious, but it happened just a few weeks ago. Supremacists are experts at manipulation, including manipulating knowledgeable people. You’ll open a box you won’t know how to close.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) August 5, 2019
4. Have editors of color, too! Diversity not just at the entry level, but at the top. News is lagging behind on gigantic stories, and coverage suffers from a lack of diversity. I was invited to editor roundtables, and I was just shocked that there weren’t any people of color there. In 2019, that’s a gigantic problem.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) August 5, 2019
Ocasio-Cortez began the thread by saying that if she worked in the industry, she would “interview real experts on white supremacy” and give them plenty of airtime so they could educate the public on the issue and teach them how to recognize it.
Her comments came days after 21 people were killed when a man opened fire at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, and nine were killed hours later in a shooting in Dayton, Ohio. In the case of the El Paso shooting, the suspect reportedly wrote an anti-immigrant manifesto before the attack.
“If I were a journalist/worked in news, this is what I would do: 1. Interview real experts on white supremacy and give them space (more than 2 minutes or lines) to educate the public on white supremacy, what to look for. Often. 2. Do not present white supremacy and racism as a ‘conflict’ or ‘debate,’” she began.
[…]
Ocasio-Cortez also argued against allowing neo-Nazis to appear online “to improve their image or mask racism in ‘reasonable’ terms/appearance! It sounds obvious, but it just happened.” She went on to explain that they are “experts at manipulation.”
— [shrug emoji] (@jtLOL) August 8, 2019
Yes, CNN gave a platform to white nationalist Richard Spencer, who reportedly turned on Trump, which was probably the only reason he was featured. It should also be noted that Trump is not a white nationalist/supremacist and has never supported anything Spencer has said or stood for because it is racist garbage. But Spencer did support the president, infamously saying “Hail Trump” at a conference for those clowns after the 2016 election. Trump and his supporters were then held accountable for this, in an attempt by the liberal media to paint us all as racists. Spencer is not someone to be admired, but he is a citizen. He can support whoever he wants. It really wasn’t a story, but here we are.
It’s been said ad nauseam, but the left will operate anything to attack the president…even giving white nationalists a platform to attack Trump, because that’s where we are now. It’s melancholy. What’s even sadder is that CNN was full of crap about Spencer, but bayonets came out pointed at the black pastor who refused to play host Don Lemon’s game of calling Trump a racist. This is CNN, y’all. Even AOC criticized them, albeit unintentionally.
Don Lemon responded to the black pastor’s behavior more forcefully than CNN did to Richard Spencer’s behavior. https://t.co/wx9sJXCq5U
— Stephen Miller (@redsteeze) August 2, 2019
