Watching professional broadcast journalists attempt to compete with social media hobbyists for any nugget of information during last week\u2019s manhunt for suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing, many us felt a familiar dread. We know, either intuitively, through direct experience or via professional training, that media have a collective power to help diffuse or fuel the fear and tension that so often triggers racial violence in this country. Despite all of the post-9\/11 reflection and lessons learned, it seems that some members of traditional media cannot help but have a racist response to the unknown. The hysteria of social media users\u2014who enjoy the luxury of using handles rather than their names and faces\u2014serve to intensify the racist response.<\/p>\n
So despite their public atonement, it still appears as if people with power don\u2019t understand the impact of their decisions.<\/p>\n
American history shows us time and time again that without an incredible amount of resistance to and clarity about the white supremacy undergirding our culture, mob rule serves as the default.<\/p>\n
So although some media members have made public apologies for the racism they fed into via silence, doublespeak or rote reporting, there is still work to be done. A lot of work. One way to begin is by examining the language we use when we\u2019re doing our jobs.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s probe the Monday mea culpa from Reddit general manager Erik \u201c@hueypriest\u201d Martin. He described the racist behavior of some the site\u2019s users as a \u201cwitch hunt.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2013, on the Internet, \u201cwitch hunt\u201d can apply to the post-9\/11, Islamophobic, and racist branding of Sunil Tripathi, the Indian-American student who had been missing since March 16.<\/p>\n
But the centuries-long American usage of \u201cwitch hunt\u201d refers to the 1692-1693 trials in Salem, Mass., of more than 200 women accused of practicing \u201cthe Devil\u2019s magic.\u201d All of the authorities and most of the victims in this shameful chapter were what we today consider white. Yet people use \u201cwitch hunt\u201d in a racially neutral way because Salem, at the time, was an English colony. So \u201cEngland\u201d was the oppressor, \u201cPuritanism\u201d and \u201creligious intolerance\u201d was the problem, the victims were \u201cwomen\u201d and nobody\u2019s white except for the \u201cCaribbean slave\u201d Tituba.<\/p>\n
The redditors who \u201ccrowd sourced\u201d the wrong information about Sunil Tripathi and the blogs that spread the conjecture were not conducting a witch hunt. They were mimicking the behavior of American white supremacist mobs.<\/p>\n
Now, think about how CNN\u2019s John King reported the nonexistent arrest of a phantom \u201cdark skinned man\u201d last Thursday afternoon during the manhunt, then tweeted that evening a self-defense that declared, \u201c\u2026What I am not is racist.\u201d As several Twitter users helpfully pointed out, the system of racism is about outcomes for the multitude of men in this country who don\u2019t appear to be white, not John King\u2019s perception of himself. <\/p>\n