Mainstream media failed Covington Catholic High School students

Mainstream media failed Covington Catholic High School students

Dominick Calcara, Staff Columnist

In 1936, BBC became the first major news organization to expand into television and offer a scheduled broadcast. Since that time, countless major mainstream media (MSM) organizations have tried to best each other in accuracy and reporting speed. For a long time, it was extremely helpful for the common person, but now as we wade through this digital age, mainstream media has failed us, using the same techniques they formerly used to assist viewers.

National news broke out on January 19 of a group of boys from Covington Catholic High School, a private all-male school in northern Kentucky, who were filmed opposing a Native American man playing a drum. The MSM decided to pounce on the story of “white boys wearing MAGA hats saying racist things and confronting an indigenous person,” offering a clip of the video showing the boys surrounding the man and smirking. Many on both the right and left were quick to denounce the actions of the boys.

Had this been the whole story, all would have ended there, but it was revealed that CNN and other MSM organizations did not release the full video. In the full video, it is shown that both the Native American man, Omaha elder Nathan Phillips, and a group of Black Hebrew Israelites, a recognized hate group per the Southern Poverty Law Center, approached the boys, not the other way around. Phillips walked into the middle of the group of boys and beat his drum, and later in the video, another Native American man can be seen yelling at the boys, “You white people go back to Europe.”

Since this footage has been released, many who were quick to condemn the boys decided to rescind their accusations, but CNN still persists with the story that the boys were the instigators. This is the issue of the MSM. CNN created a false story that within hours made everyone on Twitter think that these boys were terrible humans. It spread all across the nation, and now that they have been proven wrong, they continue to push.

Covington Catholic High School had to suspend classes until Wednesday, as students were receiving death threats. They have a large amount of armed security protecting the school. The students have been told not to wear any school spirit wear outside of the school. CNN and the MSM may have ruined these kids’ lives, and they couldn’t care less, because it was a story that made them money and pushed their narrative at first.

MSM organizations should be examined by the people who watch them, and questioned when they create stories that seemingly perfectly fit what they want. We cannot allow for these news giants to persuade our minds, they must simply state facts. Here, the MSM used its reach and speed to destroy the lives of young boys, and they will continue to do so unless we the people check them. As we live in this digital age, we can only hope that the news we hear is fully accurate and not shopped to the desire of a few executives.