Nick Bernabe | The Anti-Media

Rapper Talib Kweli takes CNN reporter Don Lemon to task over the lopsided and superficial coverage that CNN is doing on the Ferguson civil unrest. Thumbnail credit: YouTube

The town of Ferguson, MO has become a national media sensation following the shooting death of 18 year old Michael Brown, the subsequent civil disobedience and massive militarized police reaction.

Here’s the clip:



The corporate media’s notoriously pro-government slant is coming under increased scrutiny following the incredible citizen journalism coverage showing the unadulterated situation on the ground in Ferguson, often at odds with TV reporting, as Kweli points out.

Kweli makes another extremely valid point about how much of the escalations that are happening in Ferguson have been a direct result of overly militarized police presence and reactions.

A point we made here on The Anti-Media when the Mike Brown shooting first surfaced was that the corporate media quickly shifted the focus of media attention away from the slaying of teenager Mike Brown, and instead focused it’s attention on the few people who began looting. Here’s an excerpt from our article titled “The Media Conveniently Focuses on Ferguson Looting Instead of Rampant Police State“:

In the predictable manner in which the corporate media operates, the news cycle has been shifted away from the tragedy of the killing of 18 year old Michael Brown, and switched to the few who lost their cool and began looting and rioting. While the riots are newsworthy, the main focus of the news coverage should be on the death of this unarmed young man, and the overall rise of documented police brutality that is permeating in all corners of America. More Americans have been killed in the last decade by the police than the total number of US soldiers killed in the entire Iraq war, but they won’t talk about that on TV.

It’s easy to figure out why the corporate media has a tough time talking about police militarization; they were complicit in turning America into a battle field. While the government began arming local police with an unimaginable amount of weapons of war, the TV media turned a blind eye to this fact. Most people don’t even know that their local town has MRAP (mine resistant ambush protected military) vehicles, and that is partly due to the mind-numbing reporting seen on TV about Justin Bieber and Kim Kardashian.

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