Opinion: Two-Faced? Who, Us? | Shlomo Rudman

A colleague of mine recently pointed out that the protests taking place across the United States are doing more than just shedding light on the contrast between the experiences of black and white people in this country, they are also exposing other disturbing phenomena. Mr. Neuman wrote that Governor Murphy was “unmasked” when he attended a protest in violation of his own executive orders. Another entity has been unmasked as well: the mainstream media in the United States.

For decades, news channels like CNN, ABC, and CBS claimed to be the sole purveyors of truth and the frontline defense against devolution to autocratic rule, which they warn is always right around the corner. It is, to an extent, but are they the people keeping a dictatorship at bay? Hardly.

You see, the mainstream media has a very specific perspective. In the days of legendary reporters like Walter Cronkite and Edward Murrow, that perspective was, for the most part, impartial. They saw what happened and reported what happened. End of story. But more recently, networks seem to have come to the conclusion that their roles as journalists are to push a specific, more liberal viewpoint. And the George Floyd protests have unmasked that bias. Let’s take a look at how.

Before anyone even knew the name George Floyd, protests were taking place across the US. The protesters weren’t necessarily upset about police brutality but were instead upset about lockdown orders from governors that were destroying businesses. Thousands of protesters stormed the Michigan State Capitol building, shouting at legislators to reopen their state.

Reporters from mainstream media outlets called the protests “dangerous,” the protesters themselves “extreme,” and brought people on their shows who said how “afraid” they were of the protesters, and how it wasn’t a protest because “protests are supposed to be peaceful.” They also warned that these protesters will likely sicken others with Covid-19 and they were just being selfish by demanding that Michigan Governor Whitmer should reopen the state.

A month later, violent protests broke out. But was the media’s tone the same? Not even almost.

Standing in front of a burning business, MSNBC anchor Ali Velshi said “this is mostly a protest… it is not, generally speaking, unruly.” Another person said that it’s reasonable to ask protesters not to destroy buildings, but “these are not reasonable times.” CNN’s Chris Cuomo told his audience, “show me where it says that protests are supposed to be polite.” (Side note: the US Constitution allows for people to “peaceably assemble,” so perhaps Mr. Cuomo should check the Constitution for a source.)

The next time that you hear the media decry individuals who mock them and call them liars, remember the difference between how they treated one group of protesters for another. Peaceful George Floyd protests are, without doubt, justified, and the media agreed with that. Many felt that the Michigan protests were justified as well, but the media did not, so they reported on it differently. And therein lies the reason why millions of Americans hold corporate media in disdain.

The George Floyd protesters have been exposing for more problems in our society than just police brutality issues; they’ve also exposed governors who are overexerting their power and how two-faced much of the media is. For that, we should all thank them.

A YouTuber put together a compilation contrasting the media’s response to the lockdown protests and the George Floyd protests. The contrast is shocking. Watch it below.

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2 COMMENTS

  1. Yes, more people need to wake up and understand that the media has an agenda. And this relates not only to coronavirus, but to vaccine safety and 5G safety as well.

    Pharma controls the media. Period.

    If you agree with this, please reach out to your rabbinical leadership with your concerns.

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