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Multiple Takeaways from Hannah-Jones Case

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Journalists Consider Own Self-Esteem Issues
. . . . Tucker Carlson Wants Cameras in Classroom
Prisons’ COVID Toll Higher Than Acknowledged
NABJ Wants Meeting With ESPN Over Nichols
U.S. Coverage of Haiti Called Part of the Problem
News of Graves Is Personal for Native Journalists
NPR Cites Insult to Indians in the Declaration

Osaka Asks for Changes in News Conferences
Cosby Ready to Perform, Blames Media for Jan. 6
CBS Names Green Its GM of N.Y. TV Outlets
An Ida B. Wells Moment in Chicago
Investigative Group Partners With D.C. Black Paper
Writer Revisits Capital ‘B’ for ‘Black’
Many Ex-Offenders Don’t Know They Can Vote

Short Takes

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Nikole Hannah-Jones provided leaders of the University of North Carolina “a tutorial about the cost of going along with their conservative overseers,” the News & Observer editorialized. (Credit: Kevin Siers, Charlotte Observer, reprinted with permission). 

Journalists Consider Own Self-Esteem Issues

Nikole Hannah-Jones’ decision to spurn the University of North Carolina for Howard University is resonating with other journalists of color, with supporters of historically Black colleges and universities and with those who believe that UNC and others have surrendered too much of their authority to politicians and wealthy donors.

“I have been a journalist for nearly 20 years and have learned to advocate for myself and others,” Theresa Vargas (pictured) wrote Wednesday in her Washington Post column. “I trusted others to decide my worth. I felt confident in my reporting and writing skills, but deeply insecure when it came to fitting into an industry where not many people shared my background. The lack of diversity in journalism has been well documented, but looking at it in terms of numbers only shows who doesn’t exist. It doesn’t reveal what it means to stand in those low percentages.

“It is lonely. It involves hiding parts of yourself, and then feeling angry that you did. It involves accepting that at times you will feel more connected to the parking garage staff than the people who wield the power to determine your future.”

Vargas said of Howard students, “They are learning that it’s not enough to just be allowed to sit at the table.

Nikole Hannah-Jones told MSNBC’s Joy Reid on Tuesday, “The tradition of doctors, lawyers, professionals coming out of HBCUs still, it’s an amazing tradition to be a part of. And we don’t need to feel that we have to get validation from these other institutions. We can come home and build our own.” (Credit: YouTube)

“They are learning that the burden of fixing broken systems shouldn’t fall to those who have been hurt most by that brokenness.

“They are learning that it’s okay to know — and declare — their worth.

“Now that we see what stealing a college slot really looks like, can we stop making students of color feel like frauds?”

A Post colleague, Karen Attiah, wrote Tuesday under the headline, “Nikole Hannah-Jones just dunked on UNC. But for Black journalists and educators, the game is still rigged.” “On the one hand, Hannah-Jones’s refusal to accept UNC’s scraps felt like a victory for every Black person who has been held back in White spaces.

“But the pain she speaks of is real and visceral. . . .”

For cnn.com, Black scholar Peniel E. Joseph (pictured) shouted out Black institutions and scolded UNC. “The enduring power of Black institutions resides in their ability to recognize and amplify Black excellence, offering shelter in a time of political backlash and structural violence that has historically enveloped Black communities,” Joseph wrote.

“These talented journalists, carrying forward the pioneering work of Frederick Douglass and Ida B. Wells, are particularly well suited to continue a longstanding tradition of challenging limited conceptions of American citizenship, identity and democracy that at once profits from Black genius and denies its existence.

“Perhaps the newly endowed Center for the Study of Journalism and Democracy at Howard University will inspire the University of North Carolina — and all other institutions of higher education under fire from conservatives for teaching Black History — to recommit themselves to the study and critical debate of uncomfortable truths. These truths — both the sacred and profane aspects of American history that threaten to divide the nation in our own time — offer the key to a new national consensus defined by who we include in our national narrative, rather than who is left out.”

The editorial board of the News & Observer in Raleigh weighed in on the controversy’s cost to UNC, noting that “attempts by conservative officeholders, appointees and donors to steer the university rightward are having a disastrous effect on UNC’s once shining reputation.

“Imposing political ideology on what is supposed to be a haven for free thinking is bad enough. The ideologues have compounded the damage with their incompetence, first with the fight over the removal of the Confederate statue known as Silent Sam and now with the bitter departure of a prominent Black journalist who is not silent about the racist currents that run through U.S. history.”

The Black Student Movement and the Carolina Black Caucus, which includes Black faculty and students, had already issued a lengthy and detailed list of needed changes after previous incidents.

“More reports, documents and letters from the UNC Black community that have been sent to the chancellor, trustees and other university leaders are available to view online,” Kate Murphy and Martha Quillin wrote Tuesday in the News & Observer.

. . . . Tucker Carlson Wants Cameras in Classroom

“Fox News host Tucker Carlson on Tuesday called for cameras to be installed in classrooms to monitor for teaching of critical race theory,” Tom Porter reported Wednesday for Business Insider.

Carlson said, “We can’t really be sure until we finally get cameras in the classroom, as we put them on the chests of police officers, until we finally get a civilian review board in every town in America to oversee the people teaching your children, forming their minds. And let’s hope we get both of those very soon. But until we do, we can’t know exactly how widespread this is.”

On April 10, 2020, a caravan of cars converged at Philadelphia City Hall to demand that the city immediately release inmates in the face of COVID-19. The Philadelphia Inquirer wrote Tuesday that between April 7, 2020, and May 1, 2020, nearly 1,500 people were released from the city’s jails, according to an analysis by the Defender Association, but that now the Philadelphia jail population is larger than it was before the pandemic. (Credit: Joe Piette/Creative Commons)

Prisons’ COVID Toll Higher Than Acknowleged

“For 15 months, The Marshall Project and The Associated Press tracked the spread of COVID-19 through prisons nationwide,” Katie Park, Keri Blakinger and Claudia Lauer reported, with others, on June 30 for the Marshall Project.

“We counted more than a half-million people living and working in prisons who got sick from the coronavirus. Prisons were forced to adapt to unusual and deadly circumstances. But now, as new cases are declining and facilities are loosening restrictions, there’s little evidence to suggest enough substantive changes have been made to handle future waves of infection.

“With crowded conditions, notoriously substandard medical care and constantly shifting populations, prisons were ill-equipped to handle the highly contagious virus, which killed nearly 3,000 prisoners and staff.”

Separately, Maura Turcotte, Rachel Sherman, Rebecca Griesbach and Ann Hinga Klein of The New York Times reported Wednesday, “The New York Times identified dozens” of prisoners who died of COVID “but were not included in official counts.”

The Marshall Project-Associated Press team also wrote, ” The Justice Department’s inspector general found that at some facilities, like FCC Oakdale in Louisiana, which emerged as an early hotspot, those who tested positive for the virus were left in their housing units for days without being isolated. . . . Even when state and federal prisons did conduct tests, they still allowed prisoners who tested positive to come in contact with others. . . .”

“Jemele Hill joins Dan Le Batard, [Jon] Stugotz and Amin Elhassan to discuss Rachel Nichols’ comments about Maria Taylor, NBA Countdown and the larger role ESPN plays in all of this. “ (video)

NABJ Wants Meeting With ESPN Over Nichols

“The National Association of Black Journalists [is] demanding a meeting with top ESPN and Disney brass in the wake of Rachel Nichols’ comments regarding Maria Taylor in 2020, where Nichols, who is white, suggested Taylor was picked over her to cover last year’s NBA Finals because she is Black,” Tim Baysinger reported Wednesday for The Wrap.

“ ‘The NABJ Board of Directors is disturbed to learn the details of this situation and what appeared to be a lack of accountability and a desire by ESPN to provide accommodations for a white employee who mocked diversity and a well-qualified co-worker while seemingly ignoring how Taylor and others who later heard the conversation may have been affected,’ said NABJ president Dorothy Tucker.

” ‘The silence and apparent inaction by ESPN leaders over the last year is deafening and, as a result, NABJ is requesting a meeting with Bob Iger, executive chairman at The Walt Disney Company, which owns ESPN; Bob Chapek, CEO of The Walt Disney Company; and Jimmy Pitaro, chairman of ESPN.’

“Following the uproar over Nichols comments, which were rehashed over the weekend in a New York Times story that examined the internal fallout at ESPN, Nichols was left off of NBA Finals coverage, for which she . . . previously served as the sideline reporter. On Monday during her show ‘The Jump,’ Nichols apologized to Taylor and her colleagues. . . .”

U.S. Coverage of Haiti Called Part of the Problem

The day after assailants assassinated Haitian President Jovenel Moïse Tuesday night, Widlore Mérancourt, the editor of the Haitian news outlet AyiboPost, told Marco Werman of PRI’s “The World” of the danger journalists have faced in his country.

“During the situation, gangs were controlling large swaths of Haiti. Last week, for instance, 20 people were killed, including a high-profile opponent and a Haitian journalist; about five journalists were killed during his tenure . . .” (audio)

That’s just the beginning of the concerns journalists should have, Jon Allsop wrote Friday in Columbia Journalism Review. Members of the media should also be thinking about the coverage that Haiti receives in the United States, and whether it is stereotypical and contributes to the turmoil, Allsop wrote.

“Robert Taber, a history professor at Fayetteville State University who is working on a book about Haiti, wrote, in the Washington Post, that US readers tend to view the country as ‘a tropical tapestry for tales of dictators and political dysfunction, of poverty and adversity, of stories and tropes that exist in an ever-present now.‘

“But ‘these stereotypes are steeped in anti-Black racism and mask an important truth: the histories of Haiti and the United States are intertwined and reach back centuries.’ The media, Taber continued, has long been central to shaping perceptions of Haiti, and complicit in the distortions: in colonial times, French slave owners would exchange newspapers with cities along the Eastern Seaboard; after the Revolution, early American publications twisted the story of Black Haitians’ fight for independence, fearing that the truth might encourage Black emancipation back home. Since then, coverage of Haiti has been intermittent, tending to rise and fall with the US government’s involvement.”

Allsop also wrote, “Similar tropes have come up in the coverage of Moïse’s murder: passive references to ‘chaos’ and ‘turmoil,’ often eliding the complex story of his rule, as well as Haiti’s history. In some quarters, the US has been cast, once again, as a savior. . . .

“Other writers who have lived and worked in Haiti argue that Western coverage of Moïse’s murder needs to become more critical. ‘I am here to tell you, my colleagues in the English-language media, that you’re not asking enough questions about what happened,’ Susana Ferreira, a former Reuters correspondent, tweeted. ‘That’s what the “poorest country”/”basketcase of the Western hemisphere” line does: it keeps you from asking questions. And Haitians deserve those questions, at the very very least.’ ”

Photograph from the Heard Museum boarding school exhibit in Phoenix is accompanied by an 1803 quote from Thomas Jefferson, “While they [Indians] are learning to do better on less land, our increasing numbers will be calling for more land.”

News of Graves Is Personal for Native Journalists

“The world was shocked to hear about the discovery of the unmarked graves of 215 children at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British, Columbia Canada,” Mary Annette Pember, Ojibwe, wrote Tuesday for Indian Country Today.

“For many Indigenous people, however, the most shocking element of the story is not the discovery of the graves but the fact that it’s taken so long for non-Natives to acknowledge the grim details of this long-ignored history of Indian boarding and residential schools, a story that is part of both U.S. and Canadian history.

“Moreover, the news in Canada begs the question: Are there similar burial sites at U.S. Indian boarding schools? . . .”

Pember messaged Journal-isms, “my mother was a boarding school survivor; I’ve been writing about it for quite awhile. Most Native folks have some sort of boarding school story in their families.”

Patty Talahongva (pictured), Hopi, is executive producer at IndianCountryToday.com and a past president of the Native American Journalists Association.

She wrote Wednesday on Facebook, “I am a third generation boarding school survivor. My grandparents were taken by force from their parents. By the time my parents were born it had become normalized! I went to the Phoenix Indian School because my tribe did not have a junior or senior high school on the reservation. That’s how ‘normal’ it was to be sent off to one of these government boarding schools. However, the schools also changed and by the 40s they weren’t so militarized.

“Still, growing up without the love and support of your parents causes a lifetime of issues. Hence, historical trauma. We are all trying to heal and not pass on horrible behavior that was learned in these boarding schools. All this news and reactions by the majority who have never heard of government run boarding schools is creating stress for many of us. Please, read and educate yourselves and demand your schools teach this horrific history! Check out the boarding school exhibit at the Heard Museum. It’s on-line. Eskweli!

NPR Cites Insult to Indians in the Declaration

“Over the past 32 years, Morning Edition has broadcast a reading of the Declaration of Independence by NPR staff as a way of marking Independence Day,” an NPR announcer told listeners on July 2.

“But after last summer’s protests and our national reckoning on race, the words in the document land differently. . . .

“It famously declares ‘that all men are created equal’ even though women, enslaved people and Indigenous Americans were not held as equal at the time.

“What then follows is a long list of grievances and charges against King George III that outline the 13 North American British Colonies’ intentions to separate from Great Britain.

“The list, originally written largely by Thomas Jefferson, was edited by the Continental Congress. . . .

“But a racist slur about Native Americans stayed in.

“The passage charges that King George III ‘excited domestic insurrections’ among the colonists by Native Americans, who the founding document called ‘merciless Indian Savages.’

“Author David Treuer (pictured), who is Ojibwe from the Leech Lake Reservation, explains that this particular grievance refers to the idea that the British were, he says, ginning up discontent among Native people.

“But a deeper look at history also shows that one of the reasons why the colonists wanted to rise up against the British — and wage the Revolutionary War — was over the question of who would try to colonize Native lands west of the colonies, Treuer tells Morning Edition. ‘The crown wanted that money for themselves. The colonists, understandably, would have preferred to have it for themselves. So the whole revolution was in large part fought over who got to take our stuff,’ he says.

“He also notes that Native people helped the colonists in the Revolutionary War. ‘It was the Oneida people who broke the famine at Valley Forge, who taught the revolutionaries with George Washington, how to process Indian corn so that it was digestible and nutritious,’ he says. ‘So I think it’s safe to say that war would been difficult to win without our help.’ . . .”

Osaka Asks for Changes in News Conferences

In “my opinion (and I want to say that this is just my opinion and not that of every tennis player on tour), the press-conference format itself is out of date and in great need of a refresh,” Naomi Osaka, who withdrew from the French Open and a traditional press conference to tend to her mental health, wrote Thursday for Time. “I believe that we can make it better, more interesting and more enjoyable for each side. Less subject vs. object; more peer to peer.”

Osaka also wrote, “Perhaps we should give athletes the right to take a mental break from media scrutiny on a rare occasion without being subject to strict sanctions.

Bill Cosby, wearing a Central High School class of 1997 shirt, makes his first public appearance at his home in suburban Elkins Park, Pa., after being released from prison June 30. Jamie Davis Smith wrote for the Philadelphia Inquirer, “For alumni of Central High School, the sight of Cosby walking out of prison in crimson and gold, having likely gotten away with the rape of dozens of women, was revolting to many Central graduates like myself.” (Credit: Tom Gralish/ Philadelphia Inquirer)

Cosby Ready to Perform, Blames Media for Jan. 6

“Get ready, because the kickoff of Bill Cosby’s Media Redemption Tour is coming ’round the bend in the wake of his overturned conviction and abrupt release from prison,” Melanie McFarland wrote July 1 for Salon. “Who knows which outlet will be the opening venue or which interviewer will serve as the emcee? Not I. But trust me when I say broadcast and cable TV newsrooms are probably falling all over themselves to book him as I type this.”

Meanwhile, “If anyone thought a now-free Bill Cosby was going to lay low for a bit after having his rape conviction and sentence suddenly overturned last week, think again . . .,” Dominic Patten wrote July 4 for Deadline.

“In a somewhat confusing, scattered statement today, Cosby lashed out at Howard University’s rebuke of his former on-air spouse Phylicia Rashad after her enthusiasm at the disgraced actor’s release from prison. Going from bad to worse, Cosby also decried the bloody attempted coup at the Capitol in January as the fault of the mainstream media, and not MAGA morons. It was not a good look, to put it mildly, for the 83-year-old once legally labeled ‘sexually violent predator.’ . . . ”

CBS Names Green Its GM of N.Y. TV Outlets

“CBS named a new leader for its flagship WCBS-TV station in New York, another sign that the broadcast giant is committed to improving working conditions within the company’s television stations group,” Meg James reported Wednesday for the Los Angeles Times.

“The company announced Tuesday that it was promoting award-winning journalist Johnny Green Jr. (pictured) to president and general manager of CBS’ local operations in New York — television stations WCBS-TV Channel 2, WLNY-TV Channel 10/55 and its digital operation, CBSN New York.

“Green, who is based in New York, had been running the joint WCBS-WLNY newsroom on an interim basis since late January, when CBS suspended two top executives in the wake of a Los Angeles Times investigation. Green was brought in to oversee WCBS’ news operations following allegations that the WCBS newsroom was a ‘hostile environment’ where Black, Latino, Asian and gay employees were treated poorly, and stories that occurred in Black and Latino neighborhoods were at times overlooked. . . .”

Okema Lewis takes a photo of the newly unveiled The Light of Truth Ida B. Wells National Monument in Chicago’s Bronzeville neighborhood, in honor of the journalist and civil rights activist, on June 30. (Credit: Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune)

An Ida B. Wells Moment in Chicago

“The Ida B. Wells Monument was unveiled Wednesday at 37th & Langley among a crowd of spectators, public officials, Bronzeville, and former Ida B. Wells Home residents,” Tammy Gibson reported July 2 for the Chicago Defender.

“The 20-foot-tall sculpture ‘Light of Truth’ was designed by Chicago artist and sculptor Richard Hunt. The monument has three bronze columns, with spirals, coils, Ida B. Wells biographical facts, and one of her famous quotes, ‘The way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them.’ The monument is the first in the City of Chicago to honor a black woman. . . .”

Investigative Group Partners With D.C. Black Paper

The Washington Informer, a member of the Black press, is partnering with the investigative Center for Public Integrity in “a year-long journalism study to determine the factors causing Black and low-income residents, including seniors, in Wards 7 and 8 to lose their homes,” the publication announced in an email to readers Wednesday.

“Why are some neighborhoods targeted to gentrify, and what are the long-term adverse effects of gentrification on building and sustaining wealth for Black D.C. residents?

“Residents in Wards 7 and 8 have watched economic and housing growth across the city, and they are bracing themselves for a shift that is storming its way to their doorsteps.” Those wards are notable for their higher percentage of working class Blacks and are more often referred to as “forgotten” parts of the city.

Matt DiRienzo, editor in chief of the Center, messaged Journal-isms, “It’s really about service to their audience, so most to all of what will be produced for the project will live on their site. . . . we’re excited about it.”

Writer Revisits Capital ‘B’ for ‘Black’

Juliette Harris, identified by the Poynter Institute as an independent editor and writer, revisits the decision by many news organizations last year to capitalize the “B” in “Black” when referring to people.

“The ‘who identify as Black’ clause in The Associated Press’ rationale is problematic because most people in Africa and the African diaspora formally identify by ethnicity and/or nationality, not as uppercase Black,” Harris wrote Thursday.

“Black scholars and other professional black writers who retain lowercase black style are keenly aware of the sense of formal identity, pride and solidarity that uppercase black implies. They feel this sensitivity and still have specific reasons for their own lowercase usage. Some also are concerned about the pervasive standardization of uppercase black style.

“Blanket standardization obliterates the nuanced nature of black identities and assigns them to an official catch-all category.

“The ‘shared history and culture’ rationales for capping black overreach because the black peoples (plural) of the world do not share more history and culture than white peoples. The Melanesians (black people) of the South Pacific and the black people of Halifax, Nova Scotia, are as historically and culturally different as white Mississippians and the people of the Russian steppes. . . .”

Many Ex-Offenders Don’t Know They Can Vote

“As of 2020, millions of formerly incarcerated people in 13 states had recovered their right to vote,” Andrew R. Calderón wrote July 1 for the Marshall Project.

He also wrote, “We found that no more than 1 in 4 formerly incarcerated voters had registered to vote in the recent election, in four key states where we were able to obtain voter registration records along with some form of release records. Compare that to the general population, where 3 in 4 eligible voters registered to vote.

“We initially thought the story was about formerly incarcerated people who turned out to vote in the most recent election. The story that emerged from the analysis was about the barriers to registration. We saw low numbers of registrants in our data analysis, and as we spoke to organizers about it, we repeatedly heard about newly eligible voters being unaware their rights had been restored. . . .”

Short Takes

Quincy Moore of Concierge Mobile Barbershop in Birmingham, Ala., provided free haircuts for homeless men last month as the Birmingham Association of Black Journalists, in partnership with Brother Let’s Talk and the Birmingham Barber Coalition, hosted “Choppin’ It Up” at downtown Linn Park. It was part of the National Association of Black Journalists’ Black Male Media Project, Barnett Wright reported June 7 for The Birmingham Times. (Credit: Barnett Wright)
“Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is publishing a gallery of grim portraits, those of 37 heads of state or government who crack down massively on press freedom. Some of these ‘predators of press freedom’ have been operating for more than two decades while others have just joined the blacklist, which for the first time includes two women and a European predator,” the press freedom group said July 2, updated Wednesday.
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Richard Prince’s Journal-isms originates from Washington. It began in print before most of us knew what the internet was, and it would like to be referred to as a “column.” Any views expressed in the column are those of the person or organization quoted and not those of any other entity. Send tips, comments and concerns to Richard Prince at journal-isms+owner@groups.io

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