Truth Turned to a Lie: A Noble Woman's Story Maliciously Twisted

A fundamental law of communication, context of any statement is critical to understanding a statement or story. A statement or phrase taken out of context is can readily be twisted to mean not only something contrary to the message delivered by the speaker.

This fundamental law is understood by journalists, historians and preachers alike who have long learned that proof-texting is not only a dangerous exercise but one which should be avoided. Whether one is interpreting the Bible, an ancient Roman text, Shakespeare, the writings of Madison, Jefferson, Lincoln, or Sir John A McDonald, or the statements of a friend or spouse, appropriate analysis of the full text, understanding it in is context is a time honored process. Functionally we all understand the law and for the most part follow it. I dare say that if we did not follow it, how many of us would be fearful to utter much more than two or three words at any given moment.

In the last week we have had a perfect example of a violation of this law. Andrew Breitbart, a conservative blogger and operative who looks for “gotcha” opportunities, took a video clip of an address by Shirley Sherrod and creatively edited the clip and intentionally feed it via various channels into the conservative electronic media. The clip is edited in such a way that leaves Sherrod sounding like a racist and the NCAAP audience sounding like cheerleaders for her racist attitude.

We have come to understand the full story, that the “gotcha” opportunity has rightly and justly blown up Breitbart’s face. His malicious and mean actions have exposed his heart and created a wake of damage. Not only have they maligned a woman who if the whole story had been told had an enlightening and noble experience but should be commended for telling the story in the first place. This lady whose family had been the victims of racial attacks, some violent, had at that moment when dealing with the farmer a confrontation with her own pain and an opportunity to lash out.

In the following link, Scalia in her post at 3:31 PM on Monday regarding th Breithbart video raises questions about the clip as it appears that there is something more to the story and that Sherrod was setting the audience with the rest of the story. Breithbart who later claims not to have had the whole clip evidently lacked the ability to see what Scalia noted. Further he failed to do what CNN did when they saw the video, take a deep breath and dig deeper. Breithbart and various officials were blinded by the their own biases and accepted the video without any critical evaluation, without attempting to put it into context or seeking to hear the full speach.

Instead Briethbart feed a gullible Fox and his ultra-conservative friends his edited story. He claimed that the video is proof the the NAACP is a rasist organization and that Obama has racists in his administration. When the context is understood and the full tape heard, Sherrod is far from being racist. Likewise, the audience was not affirming any racist actions. Rather the audience were nodding and vocalizing their understanding of her feelings and her temptation to respond in a racist manner and then lauding her for not doing so.

Not only are Breitbart’s actions to twist and misuse the truth despicable, so are those of the conservative media and blogs for swallowing the story whole, making their judgments without any journalistic integrity, without seeking for any response and shamelessly being anything but fair and balanced. Their bias and rush to judgment was atrocious.

On Monday evening Hannity on commenting on the story stated, “My only thing is they [the administration] weren’t the ones that caught it. It was on Breitbart.com and it happened some time ago. So it’s interesting that it took the new media to expose this.” Various commentators that evening and the next day complained that the "liberal media" was slow to jump on the story and call out racism that is on the tape. These critics of the silent media seemed not to fathom that the other organizations would take their time to investigate the story to make sure it was a true story. These other organizations appear to have the wisdom to know that in today's electronic media, that pictures, videos and audio clips can readily be redacted and altered for nefarious reasons. These other organizations have the common sense to know not to accept uncritically what is feed to them and they knew they needed to understand the context and fuller story before putting out a twisted part story. In other words, the other organizations by being slow were doing proper journalistic work.

What did the slower to report media discover? There was not story to be caught in the first place. If the whole tape were shown, and the story of how she helped the farmer save his farm regardless of her past and the farmer’s attitude to her, it demonstrates that Sherrod is just the type of person to have government. As the farmer has stated, she helped him save his farm. She did the right thing, helped. What does she get for doing the right thing, being besmirched by Breitbart and a conservative media blasts the twisted falsehood to the nation, and for pontificators like O’Reilly to demand, “And Ms. Sherrod must resign immediately” even though when he was accused of sexual harassment loudly proclaimed for people not to rush to judgment on the initial claim and statement from his accuser.

Not only is the conservative media’s conduct shameful but so was that of her boss Tom Vilsack. Newt Gingrich commended Vilsack for his quick actions, “Secretary Vilsack did exactly the right thing. I mean I often disagree with this administration. But firing her after that kind of vicious racist attitude was exactly the right thing to do.” A former Speaker of the House commending Vilsack for by-passing due process and making a snap judgment when there has been no time to let the dust settle and examine the facts is atrocious. Given that as Speaker of the House he was second removed from the presidency, I am deeply bothered by Gingrich’s stance and lauding Vilsack for not following due process for an employee. For seeking political gain he has demeaned the fundamental right every American citizen has with regard to due process.

Even when the Atlanta Constitution's and CNN's coverage was showing Tuesday morning serious issues with Breithbart's video individuals like Laura Ingraham continued to ignore the warning signs while contratulating the unethical Breithbart for doing "a great piece on the whole thing. That afternoon though the news wires were showing more cracks to Breitbart's work and claims Limbaugh hailed Breithbart's lie as a "great work" and therefore signaled that his statements are may well be more based a strong dose of bias than anything else. Limbaugh and Ingraham seem to be more interested in bias spin than they are upon understanding truth and reality.

Breitbart's malicious damage is done. He has stood on tall hill, taken a knife, ripped open a feather pillow tossing them to the wind. While some of feathers can now be gathered, many more will never be gathered back up. I hope that in the end, Breitbart will be marginalized...but I fear that he will lay low and in a few months conservatives, including Fox News, will again be feasting uncritically upon what he produces.

Following is the link to Media Matter’s tracking of how the false story quickly spread.

http://mediamatters.org/research/201007220004