I stayed away from writing about the Jena 6 story because — much like the Duke Rape Case — I had a feeling that the whole story and the true story would eventually reveal itself.

All along I was aghast that so many people were willing to over-look, excuse, or justify the violent thugs (the Jena 6) who beat some poor classmate unconsciousness and then continued to kick and stomp his head into the floor.

I don’t care who was charged for what or what their punishment was in another unrelated incident. People should have been lining up by the thousands to condemn these black kids who happen to be vicious and dangerous thugs.

But that didn’t happen.

When the race hustling Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton are on the scene so quickly, and a ravenous media is obviously only telling one side of a story — well, I knew better than to buy into it.

It looks like I was right.

Michele Malkin has reprinted the entire piece, Media Myths About the Jena 6, on her blog. Read the entire thing.

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What sets this story apart from the initial stories pouring out of Jena? Well — the reporter on this piece, Craig Franklin, actually lives in Jena. And his wife teaches at the school were everything transpired. And he’s been reporting on it from the start.

But more importantly, he actually interviewed people on both sides of the story. He interviewed a myriad of eye witnesses. And what he reveals is another example of the biased media taking a story that fits their narrative (institutional racism in a small southern town) and overlooking all facts to the contrary.

Sort of like their reporting on the war in Iraq.

An excerpt:

There’s just one problem: The media got most of the basics wrong. In fact, I have never before witnessed such a disgrace in professional journalism. Myths replaced facts, and journalists abdicated their solemn duty to investigate every claim because they were seduced by a powerfully appealing but false narrative of racial injustice.

If he’s never witnessed such a disgrace in professional journalism, he must have slept through the Duke rape case, or the Dan Rather “fake but accurate”  memogate.

Myth 10 (of 12) is that one that had me scratching my head from the start:

Myth 10: Jena 6 as Model Youth. While some members were simply caught up in the moment, others had criminal records. Bell had at least four prior violent-crime arrests before the December attack, and was on probation during most of this year.

Posted by Robbie Cooper on Wednesday, October 24th, 2007 | Trackback |