A Teachable Moment?

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So depending upon who or what you read, there is apparently a lesson to be learned from the whole Shirley Sherrod/NAACP debacle.  And to the extent that this entire incident has been greatly illustrative, they're right.  Where they go wrong is there are THREE lessons here, of equally desperate importance, each standing alone from the others, and each crying out for an end to the denial and delusion that surrounds it.

First, there is the speed of the so-called "news cycle".  Yes, in the age of cable TV, the internet and smart phones, it has gotten very close to instantaneous, and in this globalized society, there's always somebody awake somewhere, contributing to the tsunami of information, commentary and spin.  There's no doubt that this is utterly toxic to any possibility that the dialog will be thoughtful, considered and productive.  But when this 'unsafe at any speed' mindset bleeds over into policy-making, or even personnel decisions, then it's time to step back and reconsider the value of partial information.  In the specific case of the Obama administration, it seems as if they just haven't come to terms with the fact that they are going to be attacked no matter what they do, and while they will take hits in the media, in the long run if they take the time to gather all of the data and context and act in a measured, responsible way, they'll come off looking better than if they just react to anything anybody dumps on the White House lawn.

Second, this ridiculous and specious argument we find ourselves having about race.  No, not the REAL conversation about race, the one we sometimes come fairly close to having before we skitter away in fear and acrimony, or watch it deteriorate into a juvenile shouting match to see who can claim the mantle of the aggrieved party in the loudest and most obnoxious terms.  I mean this other argument about race, the offensive one being put forward by white men like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck and Breitbart that somehow it is white men who are the victims of racism in America today.  The concept is laughable, except the consequences are deadly, and the future appears to be one of a nation at loggerheads over it's own growth and diversity.  It's time for the media and thoughtful people of all ideological stripes to acknowledge that white men are not oppressed in America today, and any fear that they might suffer from racial prejudice or bigotry is obviously false, and must be assumed to be manufactured to offset perfectly reasonable claims that there are white people in this country who are bigots.  There's just no way to take this discussion seriously, despite the willingness of the media to try.

Third, and actually most important, because it's turning out to be the hardest thing for other journalists to come out and say, it the willingness of activists and advocates to create false or misleading data that supports their political position and hand it off to the media as a viable story.  Whether this constitutes edited video, photoshopped images or counterfeit documents, it's very easy to create 'evidence' that proves whatever you want it to prove, and sometimes it's not as easy as it was in this case to get to the truth.  But now that ship has sailed, real journalists, out of self preservation if nothing else, need to come down hard on false, misleading or manufactured media events.  Anyone found purveying, producing or participating in stories that include artificially modified audio, video, images or documents needs to be summarily excommunicated from the business, never to be taken seriously again.  There should be a taint on all their stories forever.  It should be one strike and you're out.  Brietbart's been caught red-handed twice - why should anyone ever again assume he can be trusted with any bit of inflammatory or newsworthy media again?  He is left only to be mocked, and, for what it's worth, Tucker Carlson's Daily Caller should be on probation, on a very short leash.

If the other media sources allow lying, ideologically driven, blatantly dishonest outlets to occupy the same level of trust and credibility that they seek to represent, then they all lose.  And, of course, so do we...