I don’t want to be on this app this weekend. I popped in to see if there is any key news I don’t want to miss. Instead, I see this absolute trash of an editorial from a news outlet that had recently shown sign of being worthy of the community it serves.@Oregonian #dobetter! 1/?
If I weren’t trying to stay away from keyboards today, perhaps I’d write the op ed about the glaring privilege and utter disconnection that @Oregonian editors exhibited in writing and publishing that piece. 2/
The comfort of the white and wealthy continues to be the focus even for “free” press editors in a so-called progressive city? The O’s hollow cries for peace ignore the reality of #livingwhileBlackinOregon.
Thank goodness for independent journalists covering this moment. 3/
Thank goodness for independent journalists covering this moment. 3/
The O editors wrote about an “overheated moment.” So now that the movement for Black lives has had their attention for three months, they’re over it?? Must be rough for editors to live with the strain of knowing what they now know and not be able to ignore #injustice in #Oregon.
This movement and these moments are too great for @oregonian editors to understand? I feel for the reporters in that newsroom who are likely told “no” on advancing storylines important to a just, diverse, and healthy #PDX because the status quo is where the money and comfort are.
The police brutalize Oregonians. They lie. They trample the 1st Amendment. They spend millions and don’t create justice. They thwart change for the better. Public officials do too. Yet @Oregonian editors chose to hammer demonstrators and community organizers who call for justice?
Isn’t it your job to foster truth and transparency, @Oregonian? Shouldn’t you be interested in freedom and the rights of the minority? Or did Portland Business Alliance and cronies call, and they want you to get with the program? 7/
“Portlanders are crying out for justice.” “What?? Tell them to go home! This is Oregon and we will have our white utopia by any means necessary including dancing with the devil, or, er, with this White House. Print it!”
Was that it? Come on, you can tell us. 🧐 8/
Was that it? Come on, you can tell us. 🧐 8/
Oh, BTW, @Oregonian, any words on the DPSST, U.S. Atty, Lake Oswego, and Portland investigations into the police who violated Mr. Fesser’s right to live in peace in #PDX and #Oregon? I ask public officials every other week and get nothing. 10/
I’ve heard that landlords are targeting Black moms for eviction even during the moratorium in PDX. Do you have any updated news about that? Do you have outrage to spare or nah? 11/
Tweeple,during the #pandemic I started subscribing to the @Oregonian b/c I believe in the fourth estate. I want underpaid reporters to have jobs + careers telling the truth in our country.
I’m pissed to have spent even a nickel supporting today’s editorial though. 12/
I’m pissed to have spent even a nickel supporting today’s editorial though. 12/
Will the next @Oregonian editorial tell Black folks “to wait until the right time” until we demand 100% of our rights as Americans? Just make it plain.
Should First Nations pipe down about broken treaties, stolen waters, and harm caused by the state? Spit it out then. 13/
Should First Nations pipe down about broken treaties, stolen waters, and harm caused by the state? Spit it out then. 13/
Before I go, do y’all remember the backlash against #BlackLivesMatter that I warned of earlier this summer? Basically I said, “Oregon nice” demands the silence of the oppressed and the wronged, and would only tolerate dissonance for a short while. Welp. Here we are. 14/
Our @Oregonian wants the public to know that the police and federal political theater have won the day in #PDX. The powers that be are now welcome to tell the rest of us to shut up and go home. They have editorial cover from the paper that some still fear (er, admire?) 15/
Friends, it was only a matter of time until we started to see crummy statements seeking **your silence** + complicity + a return to doing NOTHING about the injustice that Black Oregonians face in policing, prosecution, health, housing, employment, education, and more. 16/
The police are raking in the OT pay. Politicians are praying to hold on through #Election2020 without having to do more than symbolic work. Corporate elites are glad that school is starting so their kids won’t notice as their parents align to thwart #justice and change in #PDX.
Meanwhile, this system is landing as hard as ever on Black Oregonians. No end is in sight. Systemic change is not near. Our fight is as big and difficult now as it was before police murdered #GeorgeFloyd, #BreonnaTaylor, #JasonWashington, and #KendraJames. But The O is tired. 😏
Y’all may want to take some time to tell your legislative, city, county, state and Congressional leaders not to let the @Oregonian confuse them. We are not ready to give up on equality, opportunity, freedom, justice, and real peace for Black Oregonians, and for us all in the U.S.
Many leaders, er, office holders, are looking for a way out. They don’t aim to do anything. They just hope to stick around long enough for Oregonians to stop asking them to #buildjustice. The O editorial offers rhetorical cover. Do not let officials get away with failing us! 20/
Push back against this backlash.
Remember, newspaper editors told Dr. King, #JohnLewis, and Fanny Lou Hammer to go home and hush up too. Then, they insisted that Black folks stop raising a ruckus. It’s 2020 and the next crop of media wrongness is on display in today in #PDX. 21/
Remember, newspaper editors told Dr. King, #JohnLewis, and Fanny Lou Hammer to go home and hush up too. Then, they insisted that Black folks stop raising a ruckus. It’s 2020 and the next crop of media wrongness is on display in today in #PDX. 21/
When you had the chance to make this the final fight for civil rights + justice for all in America, what did YOU DO? Years- months- from now, that will be the question we each face.
I know what my answer will be. And I will have receipts. The O has given its reply. What’s yours?
I know what my answer will be. And I will have receipts. The O has given its reply. What’s yours?
We don’t have to live like this. We deserve better.
Let’s get it.
end/23
Let’s get it.
end/23
