Media 2070 FINAL - Flipbook - Page 15
The 2020 uprisings are again forcing our nation to reckon
with systemic racism. Black Lives Matter activists are
calling for the defunding of police departments, protesters
are pulling down statues of Confederate soldiers, and
many companies and organizations are feeling compelled
to make performative public statements in support of
Black lives. Black reporters are publicly calling on the
white media outlets they work for to reckon with the
harms they have caused to Black newsroom employees and
the broader Black community due to systemic racism in
their news operations.24
From weaponized racist narratives to media policies that
prevent us from owning and controlling our own stories,
the media system continues to harm Black people. It
is beyond time that we reckon with how white media
organizations have harmed our communities throughout
U.S. history.
And as with any harm, the next discussion must focus on
reconciliation and repair — also known as reparations.
As Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones
wrote earlier this year:
If black lives are to truly matter in America,
this nation must move beyond slogans
and symbolism. Citizens don’t inherit just
the glory of their nation, but its wrongs
too. A truly great country does not ignore
or excuse its sins. It confronts them and
then works to make them right. If we are
to be redeemed, if we are to live up to the
magnificent ideals upon which we were
founded, we must do what is just.
It is time for this country to pay its debt. It is
time for reparations.25
“Slaves during slavery in the South. Photograph
display on Gullah culture at Boone Hall Plantation.”
By Flickr user denisbin; additional design by Team Media 2070
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