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Journal-Isms June 24

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Lester Holt: “It’s a Big Deal” to Be Able to Represent

Don Lemon’s Stunts Might Be Drawing Viewers

Charleston Paper Puts Legislators on the Record on Flag

” . . . Confederacy Was Treason in Defense of a Deeper Crime”

Twice as Many Killed by Non-Muslim Extremists as Muslims

Washington Post, Univision to Partner for ’16 Coverage

Alessandra Stanley to Leave N.Y. Times TV Beat

Discussion of Capitalizing Race Names Is a Century Old

Short Takes

Don Lemon’s Stunts Might Be Drawing Viewers

“Once again, Twitter is howling about Don Lemon. And that’s a bad thing?” Paul Farhi wrote Tuesday for the Washington Post.

“The CNN anchor whipped social media into a frenzy — another frenzy — Monday night with a stunning stunt on his program. Attempting to twin President Obama’s use of the N-word during a podcast interview with the highly charged debate over the Confederate flag, Lemon held up the banner and a placard with the racial word spelled out in block letters. ‘Does this offend you?’ Lemon asked.

“Social media answered swiftly: Don Lemon offends them. The anti-Lemon comments were copious and occasionally amusing, particularly a meme in which the word on the placard was replaced by a series of Photoshopped quips. . . . “

Farhi also wrote, “Perhaps perversely, this has all been good for Don Lemon and CNN. Lemon may be a kind of anti-Cronkite, a latter-day Burgundy to some, but it hasn’t driven away viewers. On the contrary, Lemon may be watched, at least in part, for the surprising things he dares to say on the usually staid CNN.

“ ‘ Let me put it this way,’ CNN President Jeff Zucker told GQ in a profile of Lemon in April. ‘There’s certainly a lot of interest in Don Lemon, and that’s a good thing for Don and for CNN. You know, Don is a little bit of a lightning rod. Frankly, we needed a little bit of lightning.’ . . . ”

 

Charleston Paper Puts Legislators on the Record on Flag

“On Monday morning, 16 reporters at the Charleston-based Post and Courier newspaper began an ambitious assignment: Get all 170 state lawmakers to say whether they believe the Confederate flag should be removed from South Carolina’s statehouse grounds,” Michael Calderone reported Tuesday for the Huffington Post.

“The long-simmering flag debate gained traction after nine people were killed Wednesday night in a racially motivated shooting inside the city’s Emanuel A.M.E. Church. Still, many South Carolina lawmakers — not to mention Republican presidential hopefuls — appeared hesitant in the days that followed to voice a strong opinion on the flag debate, presumably out of concern that their stand could have political consequences. The reporters’ calls and emails, along with a real-time interactive tally of where each politician stood, likely added pressure to finally weigh in.

“While the Post and Courier’s editorial board argued on Tuesday’s front page for the flag’s removal, executive editor Mitch Pugh told The Huffington Post the newsroom wasn’t advocating a position by launching the effort to get each of South Carolina’s legislators on the record. The motivation, he said, stemmed from the belief that ‘lawmakers have an obligation to tell their constituents how they intend to vote or how they feel about this issue.’ . . .”

” . . . Confederacy Was Treason in Defense of a Deeper Crime”

“This blighted boy with red hate in his eyes but otherwise colorless curdled milk skin — this boy is a failure,” Sally Jenkins wrote Saturday for the Washington Post. “It takes more than a weak stick like him to start a race war.”

Jenkins is a sports columnist for the Post and co-author with John Stauffer of “The State of Jones,” about Unionists in Mississippi during the Civil War.

“Personally, I pray that the lives of nine Charleston, S.C., martyrs serve this purpose: Instead of hammering and whispering on racism, we finally reach a tone of agreement based in simple self-truth,” Jenkins continued. “Surely we all can shake on the idea that the murder of preachers, teachers and librarians in the name of color demands that we examine how such an old, infectious poison got into the veins of a newborn American boy. And that requires admitting that we have been teaching fiction instead of American history. We have romanticized the roots of hate with crinoline and celluloid.

“If you went to Germany and saw a war memorial with a Nazi flag flying over it, what would you think of those people? You might think they were unrepentant. You might think they were in a lingering state of denial about their national atrocities. The Confederate battle flag is an American swastika, the relic of traitors and totalitarians, symbol of a brutal regime, not a republic. The Confederacy was treason in defense of a still deeper crime against humanity: slavery. If weaklings find racial hatred to be a romantic expression of American strength and purity, make no mistake that it begins by unwinding a red thread from that flag.

“Yet the governor of South Carolina found it easier to call for the execution of this milkweed boy than it was for her to finally call for the lowering of that banner. Why? . . .”

Twice as Many Killed by Non-Muslim Extremists as Muslims

“In the 14 years yince Al Qaeda carried out attacks on New York and the Pentagon, extremists have regularly executed smaller lethal assaults ins the United States, explaining their motives in online manifestoes or social media rants,” Scott Shane reported Wednesday for the New York Times.

“But the breakdown of extremist ideologies behind those attacks may come as a surprise. Since Sept. 11, 2001, nearly twice as many people have been killed by white supremacists, antigovernment fanatics and other non-Muslim extremists than by radical Muslims: 48 have been killed by extremists who are not Muslim, compared with 26 by self-proclaimed jihadists, according to a count by New America, a Washington research center. . . .”

 

Washington Post, Univision to Partner for ’16 Coverage

The Washington Post and Univision News will sponsor a Republican presidential candidates forum ahead of crucial primaries in March 2016 as part of a broader collaboration that will include groundbreaking polling, joint reporting projects and unprecedented coverage of Hispanic voters and the issues that matter most to this key demographic. 

The Republican forum will take place after the four early states have completed their contests and during the run-up to what could be a series of decisive events in major states. The March calendar includes primaries in Texas, Florida, Ohio, Virginia and Michigan, among others. The state of the race will determine the date and location of the Post-Univision forum and invitations to the leading candidates will be extended at that time.

“ ‘Hispanics are the fastest-growing electorate in America today and will be crucial in deciding the next U.S. president,’ said Washington Post Managing Editor Kevin Merida. ‘We are thrilled to partner with Univision. Our goal is to produce together the most authoritative, innovative coverage of Hispanic voters ever seen during a presidential campaign cycle. We will delve into their lives, how they relate to the candidates and how the candidates relate to them.’

“ ‘This important alliance with The Washington Post brings together two media giants with tremendous audience reach, leveraging Univision News’ undisputed leadership among the Spanish-speaking population and The Post’s unmatched political reporting and expertise,” said Isaac Lee, President of News and Digital, UCI, and CEO of Fusion. . . .”

Discussion of Capitalizing Race Names Is a Century Old

“The killings in Charleston, South Carolina, heartbreakingly elicit another focus on race,” Merrill Perlman wrote Tuesday for Columbia Journalism Review.

“In our case, not about race as a social construct, but race as it appears in print: Specifically, when to use capital letters or not for people who are identified with the label ‘black’ or ‘white.’

“A website originally registered to the man accused in the Charleston killings, Dylann Roof, capitalizes ‘White,’ but not ‘black,’ as do many other white supremacist sites. Publications aimed at blacks often capitalize ‘Black,’ but not ‘white,’ and there are strong feelings that ‘Black] should be capitalized. . . . ” (The home page of the church target in the attack, the Emanuel AME Church, does not capitalize “black.”)

“Most journalism-related style guides, like those of the Associated Press and New York Times, call for putting both ‘white’ and ‘black’ in all lowercase letters. Others, like The Chicago Manual of Style, allow capitalization if an author or publication prefers to do so. Dictionaries also allow both capitalization and lowercase versions. In other words, it’s fielder’s choice whether to capitalize ‘black’ and ‘white’ or not. . . .”

Perlman also wrote, “So why does it matter? Capital letters jump off a page, and signal an Importance greater than that of the uncapitalized words. One reason partisans capitalize ‘White’ or ‘Black”’is to denote its importance in messages, even subliminally, magnified by lowercasing the ‘other.’ . . .”

The discussion is not new. A century ago, Lester A. Walton, managing editor of the New York Age, argued to the Associated Press that “Negro” should be capitalized.

“Some of our race papers refer to us as ‘Afro-Americans,’ refusing to employ the term ‘Negro’ because of the disinclination of the white press to capitalize the ‘n’ in Negro [PDF],” Walton wrote to the AP on April 21, 1913.

“In the daily press you frequently read an article which is written something like this: ‘Every race was represented at the conference held in Carnegie Lyceum Tuesday evening. The Indian, Japanese, Chinese, Italian, and negro were much in evidence.’ What a rank injustice to the Negro to use the lower case ‘n’ in this instance! . . . .”

Most of Walton’s letter discussed who could be considered “Negro” and who “black.” “Black Americans are becoming scarcer each year, and within one hundred years it will be difficult to find a real black Negro in this country,” he wrote.

Short Takes

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