By Joe Rodgers
When get home from work or school and you turn your TV to your local news what do you see? You get your daily weather and sports and of course what happened in the city, which has the tendency to be out of control at points. Next time you turn on the news take a closer look onto what is being reported and ask " is the local news racist?"
Researchers in Orlando, Florida decided to study the ethnicity of the stories reported by their local news. After three weeks of observing the local news, (115 newscasts) the results were as followed:
All crimes: 65% of suspects White, 18% Black, 17% Hispanic.
Arrests all crime Orlando 1998: Blacks= 42%, Whites=58%.
Black TV suspects=18%.
White TV suspects= 65%.
Criminal suspects: Whites most often shown in custody (47%),
Blacks most often shown in mug shot (42%),
Hispanics linked to victims who are strangers (100%).
What does this mean? Well in this particular case you can see that the majority of the criminals or suspected criminals were White Caucasian, but according to the researchers most were perceived as little threat to the community. African American and Hispanics on the other hand were portrayed as dangerous and much more of a threat. Though the differences crime rate are evident in this scenario, the way the news was reported made African Americans and Hispanic to seem more dangerous which affects their social status.
I believe that the local news has a tendency to pay more attention or become more creative with stories surrounding other races. Though I know this isn't every local station that does this and its just one study, I believe this is an interesting topic to look into especially in Philadelphia. Which brings us to the question "is the local news racist?"
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