Media 2070 FINAL - Flipbook - Page 20
A year later, Congress passed legislation that compensated more than 100,000 people of Japanese ancestry who were
incarcerated in detention camps during World War II. They received a formal apology and $20,000 each.12
In 2014, Ta-Nehisi Coates’ landmark Atlantic essay — “The Case for Reparations” — brought renewed attention to the long
struggle. It came during the onset of the Black Lives Matter movement, when the public was becoming more receptive to the
idea.13
And new groups have also called for reparations, such as the National African American Reparations Commission, which was
created in 2015, and the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL), which released a reparations toolkit in 2019 to educate the public
on why reparations are “essential” for Black people.14
The M4BL toolkit defines reparations as an “act or process of making amends for a wrong”15 and lists the many harms the
Black community are owed reparations for, including Jim Crow, mass incarceration, redlining and educational inequities. The
toolkit also cites the “myths of Black inferiority” created to “justify enslavement and its inherent violence and denial of human
rights.”16
This mythology, a foundation for anti-Black racism, didn’t appear out of nowhere. The dominant white-controlled news media
and institutions — through art, film and music — have played a central role in creating and perpetuating these myths.
While many media institutions claim objectivity, journalism is an institution that shapes perception and belief.
“The media system that exists in the United States is a white-led system,” says Malkia Devich-Cyril, the founding director of
MediaJustice. “It’s not only dominated by white people, but by white-centered ideas and approaches, just in its basic structures,
in the simple fact of its demographics.”17
And as we show in the pages that follow, both owners and makers of media throughout U.S. history have used their powerful
platforms to enshrine anti-Black racism into our culture — and have also participated directly in discrimination and abuse.
• • •
1. Office of Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D–Texas), “Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee Introduces Legislation for a Commission to Consider Reparations Proposals for African Americans,”
Jan. 7, 2019: https://jacksonlee.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/congresswoman-sheila-jackson-lee-introduces-legislation-for-a-commission; Sheryl Gay Stolberg, “At Historic
Hearing, House Panel Explores Reparations,” The New York Times, June 19, 2019: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/19/us/politics/slavery-reparations-hearing.html
2. Donna Owens, “Veteran Congressman Still Pushing for Reparations in a Divided America,” NBC News, Feb. 20, 2017: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/rep-john-conyers-stillpushing-reparations-divided-america-n723151; Rep. John Conyers, “My Reparations Bill — HR 40,” The Institute of the Black World 21st Century, Oct. 3, 2013: https://ibw21.org/commentary/
my-reparations-bill-hr-40/
3. P.R. Lockhart, “The 2020 Democratic Primary Debate Over Reparations, Explained,” Vox, March 11, 2019: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/3/11/18246741/reparationsdemocrats-2020-inequality-warren-harris-castro; Office of Sen. Cory Booker (D–New Jersey), “Booker Reparations Bill Reaches 12 Cosponsors,” June 14, 2019: https://www.booker.
senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=937; Terrell Jermaine Starr, “Cory Booker Secures 12 Co-Sponsors for Reparations Bill,” The Root, June 13, 2019: https://www.theroot.com/cory-bookersecures-12-co-sponsors-for-reparations-bill-1835500170; “Should the Federal Government Pay Reparations to the Descendants of Slaves?” The Washington Post, accessed on Aug. 17, 2020:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/policy-2020/economic-inequality/reparations/ Former Mayor Pete Buttigieg, former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian
Castro, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Sen. Kamala Harris, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, billionaire activist Tom Steyer and Sen. Elizabeth Warren were among the Democratic presidential candidates who
expressed various degrees of support for studying reparations.
4. Andy Fies, “Evanston, Illinois, Finds Innovative Solution to Funding Reparations: Marijuana-Sale Taxes,” ABC News, July 19, 2020: https://abcnews.go.com/US/evanston-illinois-findsinnovative-solution-funding-reparations-marijuana/story?id=71826707l; “Reparations,” City of Evanston, accessed on Aug. 17, 2020: https://www.cityofevanston.org/government/citycouncil/reparations; Bryan Smith, “Evanston’s Road to Reparations,” Chicago Magazine, June 2, 2020: http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/June-July-2020/Evanstons-Road-toReparations/; bio of Nkechi Taifa, principal of the Taifa Group, accessed on Aug. 17, 2020: https://www.thetaifagroup.com/about-founder
5. Nkechi Taifa, “Reparations — Has the Time Finally Come?” American Civil Liberties Union, May 26, 2020: https://www.aclu.org/issues/reparations-has-time-finally-come; Ibid bio of
Nkechi Taifa
6. Ibid Nkechi Taifa reparations column; “Belinda Sutton and Her Petitions,” Royall House and Slave Quarters, accessed on Aug. 17, 2020: http://royallhouse.org/slavery/belinda-suttonand-her-petitions/
7. Ibid Nkechi Taifa
8. Ibid; Arica L. Coleman, “The House Hearing on Slavery Reparations Is Part of a Long History. Here’s What to Know on the Idea’s Tireless Early Advocates,” TIME, June 18, 2019: https://
time.com/5609044/reparations-hearing-history/
9. Ibid Nkechi Taifa; Keisha N. Blain, “Civil Rights International: The Fight Against Racism Has Always Been Global,” Foreign Affairs, September-October 2020: https://www.foreignaffairs.
com/articles/united-states/2020-08-11/racism-civil-rights-international
10. Nkechi Taifa, “Reparations — Has the Time Finally Come?” American Civil Liberties Union, May 26, 2020: https://www.aclu.org/issues/reparations-has-time-finally-come; Eric Pace,
“Queen Mother Moore, 98, Harlem Rights Leader,” The New York Times, May 7, 1997: https://www.nytimes.com/1997/05/07/nyregion/queen-mother-moore-98-harlem-rights-leader-dies.
html; Ashley D. Farmer, “The Black Woman Who Launched the Modern Fight for Reparations,” The Washington Post, June 24, 2019: https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/06/24/
black-woman-who-launched-modern-fight-reparations/
11. National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America (N’COBRA), accessed on Aug. 17, 2020: https://www.ncobraonline.org/
12. Bilal Qureshi, “From Wrong to Right: A U.S. Apology for Japanese Internment,” WBUR, Aug. 9, 2013: https://www.wbur.org/npr/210138278/japanese-internment-redress;
13. Ta-Nehisi Coates, “The Case for Reparations,” The Atlantic, June 2014: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/06/the-case-for-reparations/361631/
14. “About the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America,” accessed on Aug. 17, 2020: https://www.ncobraonline.org/about-ncobra/; “About the National African American
Reparations Commission,” accessed on Aug. 17, 2020: https://ibw21.org/initiatives/national-african-american-reparations-commission/#about-naarcMovement; Movement for Black Lives
Reparations Now Toolkit, Movement for Black Lives, July 27, 2019, pp. 12–15: https://m4bl.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Reparations-Now-Toolkit-FINAL.pdf
15. Movement for Black Lives Reparations Now Toolkit, Movement for Black Lives: https://m4bl.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Reparations-Now-Toolkit-FINAL.pdf
16. Ibid
17. Susan Smith Richardson, “What Role Does Media Play in Writing on Race,” The Center for Public Integrity’s ‘The Moment’ Newsletter, Aug. 27, 2020: https://publicintegrity.org/insidepublici/newsletters/role-does-media-play-in-writing-on-race-malkia-cyril/
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