CBS

CBS
Category: Television Stations
Neighborhoods: Midtown West, Theater District
Update - 3/29/2012
The life of all persons, no matter what color their skin or how inflamed the political rhetoric of members of their racial, ethnic, or religious group, is equally important.

I wonder why, then, of two recent murders, one has passed virtually unnoticed, while the other has provoked a national media feeding frenzy and mass protests.

At least CBS picked up the following story (3/29/12), even if other media passed on it (two Brits shot to death in cold blood in Sarastoga, FL by a black man who referred to them as "crackers"):

http://www.cbsnews.com...

It's unlikely that Vice-President Joe Biden will speak out and say that "the two young men look like my own son. It could have been him," which was close to what President Obama said regarding the death of Travyon Martin a few days ago.

That was obviously a hate crime but since it was black-on-white, no one is decrying the racist nature of these terrible murders.

"The fact is, events like the Martin killing are exceedingly rare; most African Americans who are the victims of gun violence are shot by other African Americans [93%]." -Joe Klein, Time

http://swampland.time....

* * * * *

(1) "....dozens to hundreds of black youths attacked white people as they left the fair, punching and kicking people and shaking and pounding on their vehicles."

http://www.jsonline.co...

(2) "Son describes Oakland assault that left father near death"

http://www.sfgate.com/...

This would provoke race riots if it were Asian-on-black. No major media reported this murder or the many others which were black-on-white.

(3) Man bludgeoned to death by three teens on his porch in Tacoma, WA:

http://seattletimes.nw...

The last incident was reported by the AP and picked up by only ONE newspaper in the entire U.S.

No rage, no protests, no investigation by national media.

You would do us a favor, CBS, by covering these crimes, unprovoked and under-reported, if reported at all.

But that's America...and increasingly the rest of the world, folks.

* * * * *

Fear.
Fear of being yelled at, beaten, and/or robbed.
Fear of naming those directly and indirectly responsible for the trauma of being sucker-punched, knocked to the ground, beaten, stomped upon, and shot.

Rational fear is not racist; it is instinctual, it is survival.

Strangers who use threatening, profane language ("Sh--, I'm gonna smash that mother-fuc---'s face in"), are hostile, aggressive, and in a rage, whatever the color of their skin, ARE dangerous.

I wish CBS News would examine cultures and sub-cultures, as well as social institutions that tacitly accept, encourage, or even glorify the use of violence using the pretext of "oppression," poverty, or freedom of expression as a way of rationalizing their actions and/or non-action.

I'm not just thinking here of Hollywood...

Is it possible CBS News forgotten the infamous allegations of rape by members of the Duke lacrosse team (which Sixty Minutes covered in depth)?

And why did only the local Baltimore affiliate broadcast the following story, which never made national headlines?

http://baltimore.cbslo...

* * * * *

"Sixty Minutes" is still by far and away the best weekly news magazine around, and when it presents a program like the one on the toxicology of sugar, it is doing a very important public service, one that the government under the present conditions is incapable of doing, thanks to the alliance of conservatives and corporate interests in Washington.

The news of the passing of Mike Wallace is sad. Sixty Minutes has been so long a part of the landscape of American television journalism for decades, and he helped put it on that map.