To its credit, frum media faces enormous challenges that regular media refuses to even acknowledge.
This makes frum media more ethical & uphold higher integrity than non-frum media.
The frum outlets do this legally with attribution to the original source.
In fact, most news outlets throughout the world do this.
However, the formerly respected mainstream news outlets no longer even attempt to present the news objectively.
In turn, this causes everyone to glean from a biased, manipulative source.
So I found myself reading obviously slanted and biased articles meant to ensure you think one way (the liberal anti-Torah way)—in a frum newspaper.
For example, articles about the police officer who kneeled on the neck of a womanizing criminal drug addict frequently emphasized that the cop was white and the dead perp was black.
This only serves to fan flames in one specific direction only.
Yes, these articles fan the flames in that direction despite the FACT that young black men murder each other (not by accident, as in the Floyd-Chauvin case, but with pride & full intent) far more than any other group (and are therefore more dangerous to each other than any cop is to them) and despite the FACT that black cops were 3 times more likely to shoot than a white cop:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/2330443X.2015.1129918?&~nfopt(fileDistorted=5900056764552855)
At the same time, I must give credit to these same frum outlets for offering better coverage as time went on (though the emphasis on the abusive cop as a WHITE POLICE OFFICER and the dead career criminal as a BLACK MAN continues—again, due to reprints from the mainstream—and not from frum journalists who possess more intelligence & integrity than the mainstream journalists).
But initially, reading the reprints hosted by the frum media forced me to read lines like this about the loose criminal junkie:
"...whose death has become a worldwide symbol in demonstrations over calls for changes to police practices and an end to racial prejudices."
Is that the goal of BLM?
NO.
They care nothing about racial prejudice in general—only what they perceive as racist against them (emphasis on their own perception, whether it reflects the reality or not).
For example, attacks against Far East Asians in America continue to be either ignored or reported minimally (with no popular demand for action).
Attacks on Jews, including elderly Jews, have risen.
Have you ever heard of a Floyd-sympathizer demonstrate about these racist attacks...or even merely comment on them?
Black-on-white racism (including violent & even fatal attacks) continues to be ignored, though whites who attend predominantly black schools in the inner city can tell you that such racism exists and can be frighteningly violent.
I remember when one of my high school teachers told us that in her previous job teaching in an inner city school in New York, one of the black students pushed her down the stairs simply because she was white.
She was a skinny blonde blue-eyed woman in her early 20s at the time.
Very threatening, I'm sure. Takes a real man to give her a push on the stairs... [sarc].
The pro-Floyd & pro-BLM radicals only concern themselves with perceived racism of whites against blacks.
They show no interest in anti-Asian racism, anti-Native American racism, anti-White racism, or anti-Jewish bigotry.
In fact, BLM showed up to protest a police brutality event only to discover that the victim was white, so they dispersed.
The above demonstrates how any statement that BLM or pro-Floydists are demonstrating to "end racial prejudices" is a LIE.
In general, Floyd-sympathizers (and BLM for that matter) care nothing for "racial prejudices" as a whole.
They focus only on black people (particularly—and bizarrely—on black criminals, rather than on decent, law-abiding black citizens)—whether the situation involved actual racial prejudice or not.
So again, their actions clearly show they care nothing about general racism or even actual prejudice.
As another example of how this seeps in to our psyche, the frum media gave voice to Floyd's brother's views (via a reprint)—which are wrong.
Floyd's brother cried that Floyd listened to the officers and did not fight back.
False.
Floyd resisted (and that's not the only time he resisted arrest either, though he was indeed breaking the law) and did not listen to officers.
Floyd's brother wants us to "stop the pain."
Yet what about Floyd's own children, two of whom he hadn't seen in so long, these adult children did not recognize their own father by name or by face on TV until their mother told them who he was?
What about the terrible pain caused to children when their father completely abandons them?
What about Floyd's criminal record & the pain of his victims, including violent crime, and his ongoing addiction to hard drugs?
What about how Floyd behaved like the Johnny Appleseed of babies, producing 5 children with different women over the years without marrying any of the mothers?
How could he abandon his own children (and their mothers) like that, with no contact for the rest of their lives?
But the media focused on how he maintained warm contact with only one child (after having dumped that mother and gone on to yet another woman).
Statistically, that's much more painful and damaging to the children themselves and society at large because fatherless children commit crimes and self-harming behavior at a much higher rate.
(71% of high school dropouts come from fatherless homes, 85% of under-18 prison inmates grew up without fathers, etc...[source]. And it's the children of unwed single mothers—more than divorced or widowed mothers—who are more likely to turn out this way.)
And why does the media refuse to include the fact that many criminals beg, plead, cry, and claim illness or injury—even when they've no illness or injury?
For example, you can see bodycam videos of officers called to a scene to deal with a suspicious man, who proceeds to whine & kvetch like a first-grade girl in desperate need of the lavatory:
"Why are you bothering meeee? I didn't do anything, dude. Awwww, c'mon...can you just leave me alooooone? It ain't fair. Why are you doing this to meeee?"
And so on.
The police officers remain calm, even cajoling, while calmly and firmly insisting the suspect keep his hands where they can see them and get out of the car (or whatever).
The suspect continues to whine and act like a victim...until he suddenly whips out a gun and shoots one of the cops in the lung.
If you've seen them, then you know that these psychopathic tough guys aren't embarrassed to whine like victimized pansies until they either shoot or try to run over or otherwise attack or escape the cops.
If you talk to police officers or read their surveys and forums, you see it's surprisingly common for guilty and even violent suspects to whine, cry, and claim suffering ("I can't breathe! Ouch, eek, you're hurting me, man!") when arrested by cops.
All media should include this dynamic in their reports.
Why?
Because it's common for even hardened murderous psychopaths to engage in this whiny pathetic behavior. That's why cops do not take whining & kvetching & crying & pleading seriously.
It's SO common!
And it's so often just an act.
At the very least, the frum media should include this fact in their reporting.
But they don't because they reprint from the mainstream media sources, which refuse to present a fair & complete picture.
The Most Massive & Monstrous "Child" in Human History
When describing a previous encounter when Chauvin kneeled on another guy's neck & back for 17 minutes in 2017, the frum outlet described the perpetrator as a "child."
This sounds horrific.
However, the "child" was actually a 240-pound, 6'2" 14-year-old male whose own mother called the police after he assaulted her with the accomplice of another sibling.
Ooh, poor widdle baby!
The report emphasized how the mother cried & begged for Chauvin to get off her son, spotlighting how abusive Chauvin seemed.
However, it is so common for female victims of domestic violence to turn around and plead for mercy on behalf of their assailant.
Especially mothers. She just wanted her baby boy to stop abusing her. As a mother, despite his abusive behavior toward her, she still found it difficult to see her baby suffering.
Why did the frum outlet report the event this way?
Do the frum editors sincerely view violent mommy-abusing 6'2" 240-pounders as "children"?
I can't imagine they do.
Again, a look at the attribution shows the article was a reprint from a mainstream news source.
And Guess What? I Don't Like Any of Them.
If you've read about psychopathy, his history fits the paradigm.
His 17 (or 19?) official complaints (versus the police average of 6), the way he clearly takes pleasure in making others suffer, and even his medals of valor came after he handled dangerous situations with self-protective violence.
He shot people holding guns and tackled another guy holding a gun.
Heroic behavior can be either truly heroic or psychopathic, depending, because psychopaths lack a normal sense of fear and get their thrills from risky behavior and risky situations.
So if you put psychopaths in a situation in which they get to shoot or assault someone and it's either legal or socially acceptable for them to do so, they love that.
It's fun for them.
The fact that his Hmong wife dropped him like a coal on fire, never to be heard from again, hints that she saw her opportunity to flee what was probably an abusive marriage.
(She did it in a very smart way too, by declaring her actions as a protests against his racist, abusive behavior while expressing sympathy for Floyd and family, which kept her from being a victim of BLM & the media.)
I don't know of course. It's just my suspicion because it fits a certain pattern. Maybe I'm wrong.
Also, Chauvin's own bodycam during the arrest of the world's most massive "child" allegedly shows that after the young Goliath refused to obey the police order to come out of his room (and yes, they gave him time to comply), the police rushed into his room & grabbed the "child" by the throat. (Seeing as the tallest of the 2 cops didn't even clear 5'9", the young Goliath was significantly larger than them.)
Chauvin whacked the young Goliath on the ear with his flashlight twice (causing bleeding and the need for stitches), and knocked him to the ground where Chauvin kneeled on the young man for 17 minutes, even though the young man was handcuffed & bleeding & even unconscious at one point (regaining consciousness a few moments later) & the mother was begging Chauvin to stop.
Even if the young Goliath initially fought the police (as Chauvin claimed), why keep kneeling on him after he is handcuffed?
And Chauvin did all this knowing it was filmed. (Though conniving, psychopaths can also be a foolishly cocky bunch.)
Though I think the gargantuan bully deserved what he got, it's clear that Chauvin used excessive force, seemingly deriving pleasure from it too.
Another one of the complaints against Chauvin came from a woman whom Chauvin stopped for going 10 mph over the speed limit, and pulled her out of her car with his own car-cam conveniently turned off for the incident.
(Police investigators justified the woman's complaint & agreed that Chauvin used unnecessary force.)
And psychopaths tend to be attracted to positions of authority, where they can get away with all sorts of nasty behaviors.
However, he did not commit intentional murder.
If the prosecution's autopsy reports are correct (and conflicting reports exist), Chauvin committed accidental manslaughter.
(If the Hennekin autopsy reports are correct, then Chauvin's knee didn't kill Floyd; rather Floyd killed Floyd via his own reckless drug use.)
And just for knowing: I don't personally care about any of the 3 above.
I think Floyd was a hopeless bum doing more harm than good in society.
I think the 6'2" 240-pound mother-abuser (who ganged up on his own mother with the accomplice of another teenage sibling: 2 against 1—how manly and fair!) is a hopeless brute.
And like I said, Chauvin displayed psychopathic traits throughout his career.
However, the reporting is so revoltingly biased and intended to brainwash the public.
And, by riling up the populace & causing threats against the jurors, the manipulative reporting prevented a fair trail & a just verdict from taking place.
At this point, frum media needs to find another solution because reprinting from mainstream sources no longer works due to the criminal bias propagated by such sources.
(And yes, the bias is criminal when it incites crime & violence & mistrials.)
Poor Terminology regarding the Jewish World
And gleaning from the frum outlets, I initially also used the term "stampede."
To my chagrin, we all quickly discovered the wrongness of using that term.
There was no stampede.
(I apologized & corrected what I originally wrote.)
Furthermore, "stampede" carries degrading & accusatory associations against the victims—degrading & accusatory accusations which proved false.
If it's true, then using that term is accurate & fine.
But it WASN'T true!
So that term—which is still being used in some media outlets—is false. It's a lie.
Even more recently, an alert correspondent informed me that one of the secular Jewish newspapers labeled the yeshivah victims of the Tapuach Junction terrorist attack as "seminary students."
I've seen this terminology used before in secular media.
However, in the frum community, "seminary students" are always girls.
Otherwise, "seminary" for boys has a more Christian connotation.
Why not just say "yeshivah students"—especially if you are a Jewish (though secular) outlet?
The term "yeshivah" already entered the mainstream years ago (kind of like Hanukkah or menorah—though you could describe them as "Festival of Lights" or "8-armed Festival-of-Lights candelabra" if you wish).
And the handful of secular Jewish media readers who've no idea what a yeshivah could possibly be can easily look it up online.
But for a purely English term, I've seen yeshivah translated as "Talmudic academy," which is a much better and more accurate term.
But "seminary students" sounds softer & more Christian.
"Talmudic academics" or "academic Talmudists" or "Talmud students" give much more weight & respect to the idea of the yeshivah bachur—something the secular journalists do not feel.
Sure, when writing for a mixed audience, you can fall into the trap of using a poor but common translation. I've unintentionally done it myself (though correct it immediately upon becoming aware of the blunder).
The problem isn't the occasional & accidental misuse of terminology. No one is perfect.
The problem is the intentional & frequent misrepresentation in media.
The secular Jewish media consists of professional journalists who know their audience and also write about yeshivah stuff enough to know to use a better term.
So why don't they?
The Latest Headline at Knucklehead News: WHALES DID SOMETHING ANATOMICALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR THEM TO EVER DO!
DIVER SWALLOWED BY WHALE!
Really?
Nope. Not a chance.
As we've all discovered by now, the hapless diver was NOT "swallowed" by any whale.
Simply by accident, the whale sucked the diver into his mouth, experienced severe discomfort, and spit out the diver.
Some of us immediately suspected the headlines because—guess what?--a humpback whale cannot swallow a human.
Their esophagus is way too small. A small bird is the biggest thing they ever swallow, and even that's pretty rare.
Only the most massive whale could swallow a human (though they wouldn't want to)—and humpbacks aren't it.
Yet all over the world in even the most reputable outlets (including the science magazines, which for sure know better), you see DIVER SWALLOWED BY WHALE!
Or even: DIVER SWALLOWED WHOLE!
The outlets that wish to avoid looking completely stupid simply weasel their way into clickbait headlines by declaring: MAN ALMOST SWALLOWED BY WHALE!
But again, this is all false. It's a lie.
Or this particularly weasely headline: MAN CLAIMS WHALE NEARLY SWALLOWED HIM WHOLE!
Interestingly, the guy actually said the whale was "trying" to swallow him. That could be. The whale's instinct is to swallow what's in its mouth...but the diver is too big.
(Actually, that might not be correct either. Whales swallow tons of water in order to filter out the plankton into their stomachs. They also automatically filter out anything too big.)
Anyway, if the report of the man's actual words is accurate, he never said the whale swallowed him or even almost swallowed him.
That would be impossible.
In fact, his first words to his rescuing crew members seem to have been: "Joe, I was in the mouth of a whale."
That's completely accurate—and not at all like the headlines pretending to quote him.
Because a humpback whale lacks the anatomical capability to swallow a human (especially a human wearing a scuba tank), a humpback whale cannot "nearly" or "almost" swallow a diver.
It's sort of like if I would jump in the air, then declare: "I nearly fell off the planet!"
No, I did not.
Gravity makes it impossible to fall off the planet. That's why space shuttles need so much force to escape Earth's gravity.
Because it's impossible, it cannot "almost" or "nearly" happen.
Five-year-olds talk like that. Adults should know better.
A humpback whale can NEVER swallow a full-grown man, especially one wearing a scuba tank.
It is physically impossible to happen and therefore, can never "almost" happen.
Yet headlines around the world, even in science magazines, declare the occurrence of an event that is physically impossible.
Truly, we cannot believe ANYTHING we read until we check it out for ourselves.
The Media is Saturated with Bias & Manipulation
Presented as a way of being more sensitive and accurate, the politically correct pen has indeed been transformed into a savage sword by using incendiary terminology & omitting facts.
Innocent people are defamed, good people are demonized, bad people are deified, and events distorted.
Recent years in the USA have seen the distorted reporting & incendiary terminology result in violence, assault, looting, destruction, arson, and murder.
You can trust very little of what you read in any media at this point.
Even the frum media (which is the best of the lot) & most (though not everyone on staff) tend to be well-intended, with many sincere writers, copyeditors, & graphic designers doing the best they can under tight deadlines—yet even this media as a whole cannot be fully relied upon as long as they reprint articles from biased mainstream sources (sources which operate as propaganda tanks & greedy clickbait rather than reporters of actual news).