Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Shirley Sherrod Another Victim of a Toxic Media Environment

The flap over Shirley Sherrod's supposed racist remarks and the Ag Department's hasty response in firing her is a classic example of a growing problem in this modern media age. Now that anyone with an Internet hookup can claim the mantle of journalist, those who live and die by the media cycle too often jump the gun to try and have the "correct" response to some perceived crisis. An edited clip posted by a hack pseudo journalist led to a tizzy in the Ag Department that cost Sherrod her job. Why? Because no one wanted it to blow up into a media frenzy and paint the Obama Administration as racist against whites. Did anyone at the Ag Department bother to check the story and look at the video? No. Did anyone bother to check the validity of the video? No. Did anyone in the media do their due diligence before reporting the story? No. Did anyone do their job? No, with the exception of Mrs. Sherrod. She did her job for the family she references in her remarks and worked to get them the help they needed. She did her job as a political appointee and resigned when she was asked. And she did her job as a member of our society, sharing her story of personal growth so that others might learn from it.

A potential media crisis had to be averted and before anybody bothered to do their job and get the real story, they threw Mrs. Sherrod under the bus. And now everyone is backtracking, except the hack who started the flap. He stands by his deeds, telling NBC News that he defends his actions because the responses Mrs. Sherrod's remarks drew from her audience demonstrated the racism that exists within the NAACP. Apparently now we can all be held responsible not only for what we say but how others respond to it.

The real problem here isn't racism -- that's a topic for another day -- but a media environment that is focused more on being first than on being right. There was a time that this story would have never gotten legs because reporters would have dug beyond the veneer to get to the truth. And the truth is that Mrs. Sherrod's remarks were a statement on how to overcome prejudice and not a statement of prejudice. If anybody in the media had bothered to do the research they would have found the entire tape and seen Andrew Brietbart's edited video post for what it was -- a blatant attempt to manipulate the national debate on racism and prejudice.

Apologies that these aren't direct links but that exceeds my current technological skill. If you cut and paste in your browser you should be able to find the videos on You Tube.

This is the clip that got Sherrod fired.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrNWw7TGkjo


This is the clip of Sherrod's full remarks.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9NcCa_KjXk&feature=related

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