How conservative media transformed the Covington Catholic students from pariahs to heroes

[tenderfoot]

Seen here on DU...

In just four days, teenager Nick Sandmann and his fellow students at Covington Catholic high school have gone from social media pariahs to conservative heroes.

On Tuesday night, Fox News hosts continued to feast on the controversy, which was sparked by a standoff between Covington Catholic high school students and a Native American veteran called Nathan Phillips. Footage show students wearing pro-Trump Maga hats taunting the Omaha tribe elder. The relentlessly repeated talking point — that there was a collective “rush to judgment” on the boys because they were Trump supporters – was used by conservative anchors Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham to attack mainstream media and left leaning social media users.

<snip>

1. Reframe the debate as soon as possible
One thing that rightwing media understands much better than their liberal counterparts is that the ubiquity of recording devices at any current protest tends to shatter the public record into dozens of pieces.

A particular version of events based on early footage can always be called into question, and another version put forward as definitive, as more footage, and alternative edits of footage emerge. Partisans can pick and choose, knowing that a definitive version of what happened may not emerge before the news cycle has moved on.

<snip>

2. Pick your narratives
So far, conservative media has been unified and resolute in hammering the narrative that Nathan Philips, a Native American veteran, somehow provoked the boys by coming between them and a small group of Black Hebrew Israelites, to whose insults they had responded with chants.

No amount of additional footage showing their Maga-yelling rowdy behavior and sexist comments before the event – not even clear and concise edits showing how aggressive and provocative the teens were and how calm Phillips was – is capable of knocking them off this course.

<snip>

3. Focus on the extremes of the other side
Another tactic conservative media uses is to only consider the most appalling versions of opposing arguments, and to focus their audience’s anger on reliable scapegoats.

To avoid confronting reasonable arguments or new evidence, conservatives emphasize the worst of the other side – like tweets calling for violence or doxxing. Tweets calling for violence or doxxing against high school students are obviously and clearly unacceptable, but nor are they typical of the criticisms made of the boys, their school and their conduct. They also focus the audience on liberal journalists and celebrities – mostly women – who their audience feel comfortable in deriding and dismissing.

<snip>

Keep asking "Have you seen the whole video?"

more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/23/how-conservative-media-transformed-the-covington-catholic-students-from-pariahs-to-heroes

[2naSalit]

1. K&R

We have to be able to thwart this too.

[Baitball Blogger]

10. Get the Mall video.

[BannonsLiver]

2. The attempts to gaslight here

Driven almost exclusively by one poster who believes the Covington kids are innocent victims has been quite obvious. Also obvious is the language and narrative used are almost verbatim what is found on conservative media, right down to “did you watch hit he entire video?”

I guess they think they’re being slick. They’re not.

[Squinch]

5. Clearly a marching order from somewhere. But don't underestimate that poster. He's been

successfully trolling here for years.

[Kingofalldems]

11. Sure has been.

[sharedvalues]

20. Wait, oberliner has been denying the MAGA kids were racist?

No, there’s no room for rightwing talking points on DU. Get that stuff out of here. Smirky MAGA racist was just that- an entitled white kid harassing a Native American using racial taunts.

[GusBob]

12. Man I gotta ask:

Did you watch the whole video?

[Squinch]

13. No. No one who thinks those kids were little shits watched the WHOLE thing. If we

watched the WHOLE thing, we would believe it was all the fault of the 5 guys across the street.

[Squinch]

16. It was IN THEIR FACE! As I understand it, Oberlin is quite liberal. Go figure.

And it was one of the first integrated colleges in the country. Way way back in the early 1800s.

[dpibel]

18. Red herring username

I've always assumed that the name was intended to create instant liberal cred. Like when someone signs up as "SuperLeftyRadical" in order to proclaim that Donald Trump is, after all, the God Emperor.

Kind of doubt the person in question went to the institution at issue.

[tenderfoot]

22. Michelle Malkin when to Oberlin

Malkin, a Roman Catholic,[2][6] attended Holy Spirit Roman Catholic High School, where she edited the school newspaper and aspired to become a concert pianist.[2] Following her graduation in 1988, she enrolled at Oberlin College.[2] Malkin had planned to pursue a bachelor's degree in music, but changed her major to English.[2] During her college years, she worked as a press inserter, tax preparation aide, and network news librarian.[7] Her first article for the paper heavily criticized Oberlin's affirmative action program and received a "hugely negative response" from other students on campus.[2] She graduated in 1992[8] and later described her alma mater as "radically left-wing".[9]

from wikipedia

[dpibel]

27. Hmmm...

And now you mention it: I've never seen both of them in the same room.

[yardwork]

30. The whole video makes the CovCath kids look worse, in my opinion.

Mock Maori dancing. Exchanging ugly taunts with strangers. Speaking of their black classmates in disrespectful terms. Overall, their behavior was disgraceful.

Apparently their school was fine with their rude and loutish baheavior.

[uponit7771]

25. +1, KNOWING the entire video doesn't justify the MAGA boys actions

[vercetti2021]

3. They can believe that

People I've talked to and I know do not.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

4. From what I've read here. They had some help from NBC. Even

the Daily Show seemed to be going along.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

17. I know. I usually hold them to a higher standard than the alphabet soup morons. nt

[Pantagruel]

6. Use their own words and actions

to define what we all saw.

Everyone knows what they saw and spinning the incident is really useless , especially after the diocese immediately admitted guilt and apologized:

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Covington, along with the school, acknowledged the situation Saturday afternoon, saying the matter is being investigated.

Laura Keener, of the diocese, released the following statement:

"We condemn the actions of the Covington Catholic High School students towards Nathan Phillips specifically, and Native Americans in general, Jan. 18, after the March for Life, in Washington, D.C. We extend our deepest apologies to Mr. Phillips. This behavior is opposed to the Church’s teachings on the dignity and respect of the human person.

"The matter is being investigated and we will take appropriate action, up to and including expulsion.We know this incident also has tainted the entire witness of the March for Life and express our most sincere apologies to all those who attended the March and all those who support the pro-life movement."

The Diocese knows these kids, watches their racist behaviors daily and has no trouble believing a tape showing their bad behavior. I've seen two videos of them trashing women that same day and the videos of them in blackface at ball games is disgusting in the 21st century. Their adult supervision is baffling , send in a marine.

To date, the only "appropriate action" taken by the diocese is to hire a PR firm.

[LanternWaste]

7. There's a churlish bit of amusement on my part...

watching the rw-narrative (even on DU sometimes) get cornered further and further into its own womb of obvious absurdity and blatant idiocy, to the point where a meaningless bumper sticker becomes a chanted banal mantra used by the simpletons and cultists of the planet (for example "did you read the whole book?" ).

Watching that same zen-free mantra become the punchline used against the very rw narrative being pushed is just so viscerally delicious.

Chum attracts a very special type of fish, and the opening salvo of the RW narrative was a chum sandwich served with chum stew followed by chum cocktails. And the fishes did swarm.

[Kingofalldems]

8. Kick all Covington threads.

[oberliner]

19. He doesn't seem to have a very positive view of liberal media

"They can act in bad faith and prevail, using tried and tested tactics that liberal media continue to fall for."

"One thing that rightwing media understands much better than their liberal counterpart..."

"They can act in bad faith and prevail, using tried and tested tactics that liberal media continue to fall for."

My view is that conservative media is awful, not the other way around.

In terms of this story, the conservative media is making the students into heroes - the liberal media is not.

In fact, the liberal media seems to have mainly moved on to more significant stories.

The conservative media tends to fixate on viral videos and such.

The liberal media is at its best when they cover critical topics such as climate change, economic inequality, health care, etc, and provide insights into issues that actually impact people's lives in a significant way.

[pecosbob]

24. Your use of the term liberal media negates and discredits everything else you say

Only in the imagination of right-wing rubes and their spin machine does such a thing exist.

[oberliner]

28. He uses the term in the article

I was just quoting him.

The media outlets that are more liberal are the ones that do the best reporting in my view. Certainly compared to the RW ones like Fox News and the like.

[pecosbob]

29. My bad...I though some of the characterizations were yours.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

21. Kick

[salin]

23. And I see that the gaslighting continues.

even in response to exposure. Misdirection, obfuscation, and blame switching.