Wednesday, July 19: Robert KC Johnson blogs about a letter from Duke alumni to the university’s administration condemning their failure to protect the students. Check it out.
A commenter provided a link to an article in Duke’s student newspaper. Read Living A Nightmare: LAX Players Speak Out.
Tuesday, July 18: An interesting yet predictable trend has developed in the Duke case. Newspapers have toned down the rhetoric considerably since the defense began releasing evidence. It’s important that bloggers and others stay on top of the coverage and ask questions. That’s what I’m doing, and so is John in Carolina. Read what he has to say about the News & Observer’s change in attitude. “The N&O’s cover up of its role in the Duke lacrosse hoax has begun,” he writes.
(Hat tip: The Johnsville News)
————————————————————————————————–
***Scroll down for live-blogging of today’s rape case hearing. No, not this rape case, but this obviously phony one. I doubt the former will make it to Court TV***
Salacious — Appealing to or stimulating sexual desire; lascivious. Lustful; bawdy
Let’s get real, people. Fools commit crimes every day in this country, and some crime coverage sells more newspapers than others. Media companies are in business to make money, and “sexy” stories sell.
Journalists and talking heads jumped on the Duke “gang-rape” story because the accused rapists weren’t your garden-variety thugs. They’re “rich,” “privileged” students from a southern “Ivy League” university. And they’re white.
The accuser is a divorced mother who came to their house party to take off her clothes and dance for $400. And she’s black.
BOOM!
Titilated typists with journalism degrees pounded out story after story and commentary about the alleged gang-rape. With barely a word about other rapes occurring around the same time, the media converged on Durham, North Carolina, and quickly went to work chasing down and interviewing the accuser’s family, her fellow students at North Carolina Central University, other “victims,” and hung on to DA Mike Nifong’s every word. Journalists dug into the backgrounds of David Evans, Collin Finnerty, and Reade Seligmann, running stories on where their parents lived and what they did for a living, where the men went to school as children, etc.
How many stories did Newsweek run about the Duke case? I’ve lost count.
What is so attractive about the Duke case? For one thing, it gave people an opportunity to advocate skin color preferences and talk about slavery. In an April interview with Online Newshour’s Gwen Ifill, a black Duke student said:
There are still more black people who are scrubbing toilets here on Duke’s campus than who are students. No one wants to talk about the class issue.
That there are more hard-working black people cleaning buildings at Duke than attending Duke is something that needs fixing, according to this obviously young person. I see. The fact that people are working and contributing to society isn’t as important as having more black faces at Duke. Am I reading that wrong?
Durham Herald-Sun editor Bob Ashley attempted to tell us why journalists were salivating over the Duke “rape” story:
Why is it a big story? I think it combines so many forces right now. It combines the question of race. It combines the question of, you know, 200 years of concern over exploitation of black women by white men of privilege. It contains the elements of an elite university and its surrounding community.
Of course, the slavery thing again. A black woman who strips for a living and cries rape reminds us all of “200 years of concern over exploitation of black women by white men of privilege.” So what should we be reminded of when we hear about black men gang-raping a white woman? Decades of disproportionately high black crime rates? The black-men-lust-after-white-women stereotype? (Don’t go there!)
What about black men allegedly gang-raping an 11-year-old child? What era can we harken back to and cite to explain this? I wonder how many writers are working on broad social commentary on black criminality? I wonder if Newsweek is working on a story titled, What Happened In That Apartment?
An underage girl is allegedly gang-raped by at least two, maybe 10 men, and the stories are few and far between. But journalists can’t stop writing about a grown woman who voluntarily stripped at a house party and cried rape four months ago.
Though they’d never admit it, journalists are attracted to the Duke case because it’s salacious. The alleged gang-rape of the child by several black thug-types is…I’m almost tired of even thinking about the concept…dog-bites-man stuff. Let me be clear: There is nothing nor should there ever be anything titallating about brutalizing a child.. That’s sick. But I contend that black-on-black rape or black-on-white rape or black-on-latino rape isn’t a fraction as interesting to the media unless the black perpetrator is a celebrity of some sort (ala Kobe and O.J.).
Why?
I’ll bottom-line it for you. There is something about the idea of “privileged” white men that, for lack of a more eloquent way to put it, “turns on” the media. If we assume that a majority of newspapers and media companies lean left, what does that say about the left-leaning editors who send the reporters to cover the stories? Why are they more interested in white-on-black violence than other types of violence? Steve Sailer posits an answer in Unequal Justice: Duke Lacrosse Team vs. Three (!) Minority Football Heroes. There’s more going on here than just selling newspapers.
It’s all sick, but I’m only reporting what I perceive, people. Don’t kill the messenger.
Let’s play the “close your eyes and imagine” game. Forget that the 11-year-old is a “Latino” girl living in a group home and that the alleged rapists are black football players from a city college. Picture a black little girl assaulted by a group of burly white football players from…oh, I don’t know…Duke University.
Got it in your head? Now tell us what you think would happen in the media. Be as creative as you want to be with the scenario.
Addendum: I don’t think much will happen at the hearing today, but I’ll keep you posted.
Update: I like the DCist, although it tends to lean left. The blog’s beat is all things DC, and I check it a few times a week to find out what’s going on in my city. In a post titled “Racism or Reality?” blogger Martin Austermuhle attempts to answer the question. Though our views may differ on this topic, I think he does a fair job summarizing and rounding up at least one aspect of the recent D.C. “crime emergency” hoopla.
Update II: Live-blogging below the fold:
2:42 p.m.: Kirk Osborn, Reade Seligmann’s attorney, is asking for more records: DSS, child protective services, drug, information listed in the Bill of Particulars, etc. The judge says he’s “confident” DA Mike Nifong will pass along those records.
The judge turns to Nifong, who says he doesn’t have those records. The judge keeps referring to the “third setting.” I presume he means the next administrative hearing. The judge says there is still outstanding discovery, and he’s not willing to require Nifong to present everything the defense asks for today.
Sounds like the judge is issuing a gag order-type of ruling. He said the state and defendants have a right to an unbiased jury, so he’s holding the attorneys to the code of conduct.
2:50: On to a separate matter. Nifong is talking about his office’s efforts to subpoena home addresses of unindicted players. A player’s attorney is moving to quash.
I guess I watch too much “Law & Order.” I expect the lawyers to be much smoother and more interesting. 
