by Lee Williams
Print journalism is pretty simple, really. At least it used to be. For decades there were basically two types of stories, news and opinion. Reporters wrote news stories. Columnists and a few others wrote opinion pieces.
But in recent years we’ve seen another type of journalism rise in prominence, the anti-gun story, which masquerades as a regular news piece but is chock-full of opinion and false claims. When reporters fill their anti-gun stories with their opinions their editors do nothing, because they often share their staffer’s opinions.
During my 20 years as a newspaperman, I would call out the authors of anti-gun stories whenever I saw them, but my criticisms were usually never addressed, even though we have a constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
Nowadays, journalists talk constantly about the accuracy of their reporting. However, when they write anti-gun stories, the normal journalism standards are gone, and the editing is a complete joke. The size of the newspaper also makes a difference. Smaller newspapers are generally more accurate when writing about guns than the big ones.
Case in point: The New York Times.
On Monday, the Times published what is perhaps the most anti-gun news story seen in quite a while. It was written by reporter Glenn Thrush, who started at the newspaper in 2017 and claimed in his bio that his most “fulfilling assignment” was writing obituaries, which is odd. Writing about the recently departed is far from fulfilling.
Thrush’s story was titled “Trump Administration to Roll Back Array of Gun Control Measures.” The array was described as a reversal of the strict gun control rules Joe Biden ordered “to stem the flood of unregulated semiautomatic handguns and rifles.”
If you look closely at Thrush’s story, you will find factual errors and anti-gun hyperbole in nearly every paragraph. For example, Thrush wrote that gun dealers stripped of the Federal Firearm Licenses by Biden’s crazy zero-tolerance policy were “found to have repeatedly violated federal laws and regulations.”
This is far from the truth.
Biden’s insane policy stripped hundreds of gun dealers of their FFL’s solely because of extremely minor clerical errors. It is estimated to have increased the FFL revocation rate by 700 percent. Thrush never mentioned that, or that the ATF occasionally sent its poorly trained SWAT team to the gun dealers’ homes, or that the dealers were handcuffed and laying on their stomachs during their conversations with the ATF. In one case, the alleged suspect never got the chance to respond to any of the federal allegations, because ATF’s SWAT team shot and killed him in his own home before they had a chance to talk.
Thrush was not kind to Attorney General Pam Bondi or her plan to use the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division to investigate the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department to determine whether it is “engaging in a pattern or practice of depriving ordinary, law-abiding Californians of their Second Amendment rights.”
Even though this task is clearly covered by federal law, Thrush claimed that Bondi was “repurposing an investigative unit that had been used to expose racial discrimination and police violence by local enforcement agencies.”
Bondi’s decision didn’t involve any repurposing. The federal laws that govern the Civil Rights Division are very clear, unlike Biden’s ATF rules.
The author spoke to the executive director of Giffords, who falsely claimed Trump gave his seal of approval to “reckless dealers who are willing to sell guns to traffickers and criminals.” Over the years I have met more than a few gun dealers, but no one willing to sell arms to anyone with a criminal record. That this actually made it into a New York Times story is incredibly damning.
Thrush also claimed that the ATF took “an abrupt U-turn” from the schemes of Biden and ATF’s former director to “stem the flood of unregulated semiautomatic handguns and rifles that have contributed to mass shootings and exacerbated the violent crime wave that peaked after the coronavirus pandemic.”
A flood of unregulated handguns and rifles?
Remember that the next time you fill out an ATF Form 4473.
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The Gun Control ny times is not fit for a birdcage.
Well, if it’s good for ANYthing, the bottom of a birdcage would be the most appropriate.
I did line my bird’s cage with the New York Times………..the bird bit me!
Yellow journalism never went away it just got bleached past being noticed for a while.
“Yellow journalism never went away it just got bleached past being noticed for a while.”
“Journalism” has never been “honest and objective”. Every “newspaper” (media in general) had and has a political agenda; even being honest and objective is political.
Think about it: if a newspaper is truly apolitical, why would there be a need for more than one? “Honest and objective” would not need different viewpoints. So. . . .who, which cosmic judge determines what is truly “honest and objective”?
There is a generally accepted recipie for journalism: Who? What? When? Where? Why?. While the first four might be said to be objective (unless totally ignored for political gain), “Why?” is the operative means of blending point-of-view into a news outlet.
We are talking about flawed people, folks. The seven deadly sins always apply (pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust); no one is exempt. And with AI, can we any longer believe anything we see or hear?
I didn’t believe most of it before ai
“I didn’t believe most of it before ai”
Prudence is a virtue.
The difference from then to now is we have a slim majority that believes the papers to be honest and objective and not overly political. Something dumbed down enough of the population to make mass media propaganda very effective for a long time.
There are just a lot of stupid, gullible people.
And they all get to vote and move to places their choices have not yet ruined. There is much to be addressed once the waste fraud and abuse reductions hit the point of diminishing returns.
“There are just a lot of stupid, gullible people.”
Some accurate assessments of the IQ of the public at large, can get you cancelled by govt.
“Something dumbed down enough of the population to make mass media propaganda very effective for a long time.”
Probably the promotion of “feelz” as the only value proposition.
Violent crime wave and all that made me think of Kyle R.
Then I thought “One Ranger one riot.”
One young man with an AR put the damper on rioting when the police had lost control.
Roof top Koreans.
When law enforcement balks or become inefficient the citizens know the answer is not less but more firearms.
Citizen Militias being necessary to the security of a free state.
The Second Amendment is not about hunting and it’s not about limiting Our right to possess weapons of war.
Yes it is an assault weapon.
We’ve played the NRA game of spilting hairs long enough.
Bring The Power Back.
“Nowadays, journalists talk constantly about the accuracy of their reporting. However, when they write anti-gun stories, the normal journalism standards are gone, and the editing is a complete joke.”
ProTip: It’s not just anti-gun stories.
When the Babylon bee gave better pandemic reporting than anything in main stream media your cautionary is vastly understated
Blow up your TV, throw away your paper,
Go to the country,build you a home.
plant a little garden, eat a lot of peaches,
try and find Jesus on your own
John Prine
Is this the same New York Times that has armed guards in the lobby?
It turns out that they don’t really hate guns. They just hate you.
The NYT serves the interests of the political classes and the political classes of all sides absolutely hate the idea of “little people” with firearms. To the political classes, they might get ideas above their station.