In the midst of a media frenzy, and a statement from the prosecution in the Michael Brown case slamming the corporate media’s “insatiable appetite” for shocking headlines, one local news station epically underplayed its coverage of the grand jury’s decision in Ferguson, with a series of tweets about dancing celebrities.
While the cable news channels scrolled “breaking news” banners for hours running up to the decision, before there was any breaking news, and had reporters running around the town in a blind panic, ABC affiliated WTVC NewsChannel 9 advised its viewers to chill out because the normal mind numbing programming would not be interrupted.
“Don’t worry, Dancing with the Stars will be back after the special report. #Ferguson” the station’s remarkable tweet read.
We've removed our very poorly worded tweet from earlier to stop the bad signal from spreading. Please accept our sincerest apologies.
— WTVC NewsChannel 9 (@newschannelnine) November 25, 2014
The “outraged” responses came thick and fast:
@newschannelnine what kind of racist piece of trash network
— folie á deux (@babykrule) November 25, 2014
. @newschannelnine a tweet exclusively for the racist, ignorant, dancing fanatics?
— jessica (@h_iggins) November 25, 2014
@newschannelnine wow I guess dancing with the stars is more important than a young black life! Racist crackers!! #Ferguson
— SuckaFree (@KeepingIt420) November 25, 2014
The internet almost broke, and instead of correcting the situation, Channel 9 made things worse by continuing to tweet individual apologies.
@michaelduterte no, please – it was a mistake, it won't happen again, we promise, gary.
— WTVC NewsChannel 9 (@newschannelnine) November 25, 2014
@newschannelnine even your apology tweets sound like they were written by a third-grader
— Herzog (@herzogpilgri) November 25, 2014
Meanwhile, the cable networks repeated images of violence and burning cars and buildings, armageddon style, split-screening them with Obama urging calm and restraint.
The apologies from Channel 9 continued.
.@lovesickglee yes – we were just anticipating people complaining. but we handled in a completely lunkheaded way. we're sorry.
— WTVC NewsChannel 9 (@newschannelnine) November 25, 2014
But to no avail…
.@newschannelnine should stop tweeting. Trying to tweet apologies to everyone is just making it worse.
— Josh Martin (@Jmart730) November 25, 2014
@newschannelnine because ignoring racism is as simple as deleting a racist tweet.
— Taymy Caso (@tcaso0813) November 25, 2014
Some of the cable news anchors seemed almost embarrassed by the feature presentation style looping destruction. CNN’s Anderson Cooper at one point noting “I don’t want to imply that all of Ferguson is aflame,” as a chopper circled over a massive raging fire. Cooper added “Seeing the pictures, you might think that. That is not the case at all.”
Meanwhile, in between the looping images of carnage, each network trotted out its usual talking heads to provide their own different, but ultimately insignificant, political slant.
Fox News paraded Rudy Guliani, who doubled down on his black on black violence diatribe, while promoting law and order worship, while MSNBC dusted off Al Sharpton, who openly questioned the legitimacy of the grand jury, without providing any facts or context. Then Fox News attacked MSNBC for employing Al Sharpton. And so it continued.
Meanwhile, the actual events in Ferguson faded into a fiery background, and the majority of Americans switched channels to watch Dancing With The Stars, ultimately meaning that WTVC NewsChannel 9 had the most accurate #Ferguson related facts on the night.
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Steve Watson is a London based writer and editor for Alex Jones’ Infowars.com, and Prisonplanet.com. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham, and a Bachelor Of Arts Degree in Literature and Creative Writing from Nottingham Trent University.
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