Jezebel 
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New York, 2:14 AM
Fri Dec 18
65 posts in the last 24 hours
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11/12/09
However, if a misreporting of the facts continues (and I predict it will) then that will be entirely based on racism in my opinion. #forthood
11/12/09
That's called business as usual - they never admit mistakes. #forthood
11/12/09
This woman was shot in the line of duty while behaving heroically. Now that you've bungled the PR on this, it's less likely Angelina Jolie will play the role, but if you had thought about it more carefully and waited to reveal the true, confirmed story, you might have been able to get Angie and added in Brad Pitt to play the equally heroic partner! #forthood
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Also, the press is going to bark along after whatever they get and the public only remembers the first thing anyone says to it, so I take that silliness as default behavior. #forthood
11/12/09
Personally, I think had Todd been the whitest dude on the planet, they still would have rushed to give credit to Munley first. It's the same reason they lied about Tillman: get our attention focused elsewhere so nobody asks about their complete and total fuck-up. "Don't pay attention to the fact that we totally dropped the ball on stopping this dude when he indicated violent tendencies; instead, here's a much better story about spunk and Amurrican heroism!"
If they had talked about Munley and Todd equally, cable news shows would have had much less airtime spent on "petite firecracker" and a lot more on "how the HELL did you guys let this happen?"
The military's first priority isn't giving credit to white chicks, it's covering their ass. Crediting Munley instead of Todd served their purpose well. #forthood
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11/12/09
But life is not an action movie, and what matters is he got stopped. And the media's handling of this narrative is really pissing me off. "You're so short and little, why not call for help Sgt. Munley?" "Well, Ann Curry, I consulted our LadyCop Help Matrix and while I am short and petite, I was not on my period and therefore felt I could handle it." #forthood
11/12/09
I'm hope both officers get the credit they deserve. Well done by all. #forthood
11/12/09
They're both heroes, none the less, but yeah, wish the media would stop trying to create the narrative so quickly. #forthood
11/12/09
Then the other side is that a story about a black man winning the battle against another not-white man isn't as heroic and picturesque. Black men with guns are scary, right, and so to tell the story of a black man with a gun would bring to mind too many scary associations for the story to be worthwhile.
So highlighting the white woman's role and at the same time downplaying the black man's role play into the same whirlwind of racist and sexist associations that the media inevitably buys into and perpetuates. But it certainly isn't conscious--I doubt anyone heard the whole story and adjusted it for their own reporting. I think probably there were indications that the reported story wasn't the whole truth, but those gaps weren't questioned or pushed because the half-truth fit into an already conveniently formed narrative.
Whatever. Both of these people are bad ass. #forthood
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Definitely cringe-worthy. How is that remotely pertinent to what she did? #forthood
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11/12/09
I knew as soon as Ann announced that her father was there that something awful was about to go down.
Whether Munley or Todd is more of the hero, I'm not sure. But why did this woman have to have her father AND husband in attendance to praise her? Aren't her accomplishments self-evident and not in need of embellishment from uninvolved parties?
Apparently the producers at Today didn't think Todd needed his wife or mother there (or to explicitly detail his physical attributes).
Gah. #forthood
11/12/09
1. Almost all of the initial reports from the Fort Hood shootings were wrong. There were reports that Hasan was dead, that there were two or three shooters, and that his name wasn't even his name. I am not surprised that reports on who actually took down Hasan would be all mangled as well. It would actually be par for the course.
2. It made for a cool narrative. The image of a physically small, highly trained woman hunting down and shooting an armed and dangerous mass murderer gave me a bit of a thrill, I'll admit, especially as it is not the kind of story we are used to hearing about. I can see why news people have run with it, because it seems to be one of those man-bites-dog stories with a bit of a girl-power (as much as I hate that term) sensibility tossed in. Of course, as cool as we might find a narrative to be, if it's not what actually happened, it should not be reported as fact. Unfortunately journalists all too often see narratives they like or understand, then will turn and try to cram the facts to fit those storylines rather than letting the storyline unfold organically. (I see this all the time in my own newsroom.) If we want to only write and talk about cool shit, then we need to go write fiction or something and leave the reporting to actual reporters. #forthood
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Size doesn't matter asshat Curry. #forthood
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