The story was absolutely shocking.
A 13-year-old white student in Kansas City was reportedly doused with gasoline by two older black youths and set afire.
According to a columnist in the “American Thinker” magazine media coverage of what exactly happened is almost as shocking.
Some local talk radio hosts have said it should be considered a hate crime since it was racially based. Another accused the burned student of making up the story since his attackers have not been arrested yet. Others have avoided the story entirely.
Kansas City Star crime reporter Tony Rizzo’s initial story about the attack (3/1) avoided the race issue entirely.
In his March 5 follow-up story about the incident Rizzo quoted a police report where the burned boy’s father said the attackers told his son, “This is what you get.”
But is that really what was said?
Not according to a pair of columns by Selwyn Duke in the conservative “American Thinker” site. (He did not respond to a request by Bottom Line to discuss them.)
In a column (March 1) Duke opens with: ‘“This is what you deserve. You get what you deserve, white boy.” So spewed the attackers of Melissa Coon’s 13-year-old son, as they doused him with gasoline and set him alight.’”
Duke then examined how Kansas City media outlets sanitized the details of what transpired. He says FOX 4 avoided race enirely in its story; KCTV mentioned the races involved, but omitted the “white boy” comment; KMBC used the white boy quote, but did not mention the race of the alleged attackers. (Note: Duke did not mention 41 KSHB, but its story used the police quote and noted the attackers were black, but not the race of the burned boy.)
Duke has now written a follow-up story (3/7) where he outlines blatant racism in the Kansas City schools against white students with a focus on East High School. In fact, he claims some of the teaching at the school has led directly to attacks on white students.
His stories are damning indictments of the KC school system.
They also seem to be a damning indictment of journalism in Kansas City.
STORY UPDATE: KMBZ afternoon talk show hosts Dana Wright and Scott Parks reported (3/8) that KMBC in its story (2/9) did, in fact, quote the boy’s mother as saying “‘This is what you deserve. You get what you deserve, white boy’.”‘ KMBZ also reported the races of the individuals involved.