while my content of the US sh*tshow is largely coming from CNN and MSNBC..... It is treasure posts like this from Kevin that make me continue to appreciate TVorNotTV.
On Mon, Jun 1, 2020 at 7:51 PM Kevin M. <drunkbastar...@gmail.com> wrote: > I hadn’t planned on watching the local news in LA, because I know they are > all shite. I also know they slashed their operating budgets, they hired > unqualified teenagers with bleached hair and tanned skin, and they focus on > flash over substance, but it turned out my fiancée’s house was encircled by > stores and businesses being looted, a curfew had been imposed, and I needed > to know actual information pertinent to what was occurring literally on the > doorstep. So I tuned in. Ugh. > > A note about the internet and social media and newspapers online: Nobody > handled (or is handling, as this is ongoing) this crisis well. All are as > guilty of the same crimes of ignorance and uninformed opinion as local TV > news. One of the biggest struggles of this crisis is there is literally > nobody to turn to for unbiased, factual, relevant, timely information. I’m > not employing hyperbole here. There is nobody in Southern California with > any sense of journalism who has either the intellect, the expertise, or the > financial means to report on this story. Pointing a camera at something and > saying “Hey! Look at that!” is not journalism. As much as the main focus of > these protests are police failures, the failures of the press are certainly > being brought front and center, as well. > > I’m going to single out one “reporter” (those are sarcastic air-quotes) > named Brittney Hopper, but don’t assume she is the worst of the bunch. She > is sadly typical of the crap I watched yesterday, and her specific form of > crap is merely memorable in how truly bad she is at her job. I’m not saying > she deserved to have rocks thrown at her in her newsvan last night in the > CVS parking lot, but I’m not not saying that, either. > > Hopper was assigned to cover the protests in Long Beach. I’m not saying > she was the wrong choice for the job, but if I was an assignment editor and > I wanted someone who could gain the trust of the largely African American > group of protestors, an eight pound blonde would not have been my first, > second, or twenty-third choice. But one assumes the pickings are slim over > at CBS2/KCAL9. A note for those not living in the LA area: Two rival TV > stations share the same news team for budget reasons, and of course because > we all know that fewer choices for news is always better (?!). So away > Hopper went to Long Beach. > > Things started to get beyond her ability long before the looting started. > Whether it was the guy on the street she chose to interview live without > either she or a producer talking with him ahead of time, who said “I am a > Marine Corps veteran, f*ck the police! F*ck the police! F*ck f*ck f*ck the > f*cking police!” or the kid on the skateboard (guessing he was 12 or 13) > who kept skating behind her with both middle fingers pointed in her > direction, Hopper was out of her depth. She could not control a crowd of > drunk lemmings, let alone deal with a protest filled with angry people. > > Then the looting started. > > Hopper was at The Pike, an outdoor shopping center not far from the Queen > Mary. Now, I don’t mean to belittle the damage and loss of property > suffered by property owners, because it is real and heartbreaking, but > frankly every police chief and sheriff In Southern California has talked > about little else in their largely unchallenged press conferences and > interviews, so I’m going to assume that as a given and move on. Throughout > the day and into the night, Hopper kept injecting herself into the story. > She was experiencing this... it was all happening to her... it wasn’t about > the protesters or the police or the citizens of the city, and it certainly > wasn’t about George Floyd... it was about Brittney Hopper. At no point was > this more evident than when she said on-air that what she was seeing was > “like a war zone” or “like a third world country.” Maybe she has experience > in war zones and developing nations, and kudos to her if she has, but The > Pike in Long Beach has a Hooters and a Sunglasses Hut, so although there > were some broken windows and other damage to property, the comparison seems > at best insensitive to both the residents and the protesters. > > And so as the evening dragged on, and KCAL and KCBS cut from one bit of > looting to another, no context, no substance, no coverage of the largely > peaceful groups of protesters, Hopper ended up at a CVS pharmacy, where she > was shocked, shocked she’ll tell you, to find no police presence. And as > she was speculating about what might be going on inside the CVS, pointing > out that there was no way she was going to venture inside because guessing > about it live on-air was the more professional way to go, someone threw a > rock at her windshield, an event so monumental to the life of Brittney > Hopper that she posted it on her social media. > > If it seems as if I’m being unduly harsh towards Hopper, I probably am. As > I said, everyone covering the story was as inept as she was. Over on ABC7, > they got 45 seconds of footage of people running out of a store that they > loved so much they showed it non stop for nearly two solid hours. And on > NBC4, after having been shamed by Lebron James for not showing any of the > peaceful protests, Robert Kovacik held up an iPad and showed seven seconds > of a peaceful protest in Colorado. It was the protest where everyone stayed > still and chanted “I can’t breathe” the entire length of time George Floyd > was crushed to death by a police officer... very moving if you haven’t seen > it. NBC4 couldn’t be bothered to upload the video; they just had a guy hold > up his tablet for a few seconds to prove they weren’t just focused on the > destruction... then they immediately returned to focusing on the > destruction. > > I could lament that at a time when I needed to know what was going on, no > news agency existed to inform me, but instead — and unlike Brittney Hopper > — I choose to not make it about me. The changes that need to occur for > everyone in our country need to begin with a substantive conversation. That > means people skilled at asking questions and holding subjects accountable > need to put people with opposing viewpoints in a room and get them talking, > and the public needs to hear and react to those conversations, and from > that public debate, new ideas and even new leaders can emerge. That’s how > the change is going to happen. And that is exactly what we didn’t see on > the news, and what we didn’t see online, either. > -- > Kevin M. (RPCV) > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "TVorNotTV" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to tvornottv+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAKgmY4DJoPD7fARmnttkKXZvSP3jNeiMGymeK1Nwj5Y%3DDWjPkA%40mail.gmail.com > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAKgmY4DJoPD7fARmnttkKXZvSP3jNeiMGymeK1Nwj5Y%3DDWjPkA%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > -- Doug Eastick <east...@mcd.on.ca> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAK5Q1BqUR9RgCZrnawisj90v2B5Y63iYpD7tfNmD88KRcR6iJw%40mail.gmail.com.
