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MEDIA ON FORMER RAVENS' RUNNING BACK LIKE "WHITE ON RICE"
 Commentary by Jackie Wright
The images of the sad and unfortunate saga of Mr. & Mrs. Ray Rice have pummeled the minds of not only America, but also, the world over and over again. The outrage over domestic violence stirred by those images has reached a fever pitch.
I looked at the raging coverage and my first thought after feeling the Rices' pain, was who is positioning for profit? Who is pushing the behind the scene buttons so they can topple the current NFL regime and get their "person of interest" in position? Why did the Rice case catch fire like it did? It was a very bad case of domestic violence, but no one died.
During the same media cycle, domestic violence took the lives of at least 11 people including children as the media harangued about the Rices. "White on Rice" seems to have yet another nuance in this case. Media was all over Ray Rice, but in the case of the South Carolina man who took his five children to Alabama to kill and dump them and the case of the Florida grandfather who killed his grandchildren, the media coverage was deafeningly silent in comparison to the attention given the Rice case.
Article: http://www.thewrap.com/espns-hannah-storm-speaks-out-emotionally-on-nfls-ray-rice-scandal-video/
Storm trooper? Hannah Storm... Wow... the impassioned soliloquy wreaked of disingenuousness and jockeying for additional visibility.
When I recently encountered longtime Bay Area educator Dr. Shirley Thornton at "No Excuses Sunday" at the historic Jones Memorial led by Reverend Staci Current, she said it best: "There is no national dialogue until there is a Black face." "Black Face," I mused. I think my head snapped back a little in the "what you say?" position. Speaking of media coverage, Dr. Thornton gave several examples including "date rape wasn't talked about to the degree it was, until Mike Tyson." I remember thinking or should I say feeling "whoa," Dr. Thornton is on to something and I will have to have more than a passing conversation in the future.
We're thirty years past, "1984" and media manipulation as described in George Orwell's book appears to be the flavor of our day when one considers the TMZ style of "yellow journalism" and the constant replay of the video of the Rice's in the elevator. As horrific as it is, did one mainstream media company examine what it the world may be wrong with Rice?
If Hannah Storm and ESPN really want answers to the question "What does the NFL stand for," why aren't they playing images over and over again of Pittsburgh Steelers legend, "Iron Mike" Webster's brain autopsy and that of the other 75 of the 79 players' brains who had CTE (Chronic traumatic encephalopathy)? Why aren't they asking the question about the impact of CTE on domestic violence? The answer could lie in the billions of dollars that are on the table and how those dollars pay Storm and all the salaries at ESPN and other media outlets.
Frontline's "League of Denial" asks the questions of the NFL that were virtually ignored in a news conference during the Super Bowl way back in 2009 where thousands of reporters gathered.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sports/concussion-watch/76-of-79-deceased-nfl-players-found-to-have-brain-disease/ (Take a moment to read the comments following the article....eye-opening.)
Did or will ESPN flash those horrific images over and over again of brains diseased by concussions? Given the money on the table and Dr. Thornton's philosophy, "There is no national dialogue until there is a Black face," I think not.
"Right is right and right don't wrong nobody," as my paternal great grandmother "Momma Nora" used to say. So with that, if Janay Palmer Rice chose to forgive Ray Rice and marry him, why isn't the rest of society forgiving? Why strip the family of their livelihood? There needs to be an "Underground Railroad" of compassion in at least the Black community to put their arms around this young couple and support them through this media storm driven by greed.
At the least, The Black community should step up and make sure Ray Rice can feed his family. Ray and Janay Rice and their adorable daughter should not be used as scapegoats for America's societal violence problem. Anytime media blackballs or demonizes, it is important to address the core problem, but don't let media dominate our choices as media are guilty of serving up unbalanced and distorted reports. The media are made up of people; people with bias and prejudices, fear of bosses, fear of losing advertisers, fear of losing jobs, jealousies, and visions of grandeur among other things.
Who is watching the watchdog? It's important to call media constantly into account. When was the last time your social justice organization checked the public file of your local TV stations or contacted the FCC about cable TV abuses or Internet neutrality?
Trayvon Martin, Ferguson and on and on have their beginnings in the seeds planted by media. Dr. Jerry Kang's "Trojan Horses Race" talks about the bias media create that can impact how "we even use a gun." Let's not shoot from the hip! Let's systematically observe and take action to make sure media are not adding madness to our lives.
The question is not only for the NFL. What do we in America stand for? |