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by rayiner
1951 days ago
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Activists, at the very least, exaggerate wildly. I’m a huge fan of and regular donor to the ACLU. But I had to stop reading their newsletter because Anthony Romano (or whoever writes these newsletter updates in his name) has a loose relationship with the truth. I would read about some criminal case they were involved in, and work up the intended frothy outrage. Then I’d read the Wikipedia article on it, and find out that they’d left out hugely important facts and mischaracterized the whole story. There was one about a teenager who had gotten together with a gang of his friends and murdered a pizza delivery driver in broad daylight in front of his family. The newsletter completely left that part out, making it seem like he was simply present when his friends had unexpectedly done something. Now there was a real legal issue buried in there. The folks on the legal side are top notch—and it’s entirely right and proper to get a bad person off on a technicality to defend an important legal principle. But the ACLU PR team would just fluff up the underlying story to make the party involved seem sympathetic as well. I can stomach this and just not read the newsletter when it comes to activist organizations. They’re in the business of leveraging outrage to further good causes. The blurring of lines between activism and journalism, however, is a total disaster. When the media whitewashes issues to further some perceived good cause, all it does is light their credibility on fire. |
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