New York, NY – On Oct. 10, Ch. 11’s local newscast included two stories about suspected hate crimes, two disturbing stories, yet stories presented in two very different ways.
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The first led the broadcast, thus it was positioned as the station’s most important of the day. It was about a black Columbia University professor who had found a hangman’s noose pinned to the door of her office. Cathy Hobbs, Ch. 11’s reporter, made it very clear that she felt that the professor, Madonna Constantine, had been the victim of horrible, intolerable and totally inexcusable race-based crime. And on the surface, it seemed all of that.
Later in the newscast, where stories deemed less important are placed, Ch. 11 reported that an Orthodox Jewish man, 53-year-old Mordechai Moskowitz, in Lakewood, N.J. had been beaten into critical condition by a man using a baseball bat.
Ch. 11’s reporter, Vanessa Tyler, further reported that the suspect is a black male in his 30s and, according to witnesses, the attack was unprovoked. Thus it was being investigated as a hate crime. Lakewood is home to several ethnic communities, including a large Orthodox Jewish population.
And then Tyler added something else, something mind-blowing. “Some people say that people get along here,” she said, “Other people say [that] the Jewish community is clique-ish and un-neighborly.”
Good grief. Does that mean that there was some justification for a member of that Jewish community to be beaten nearly to death with a baseball bat?
Imagine if Ch. 11’s lead report about the noose included similar language:
“Some people say that people get along here at Columbia University. Other people say that the black community at Columbia is clique-ish and unfriendly.” [nypost]
I saw the channel 11 report and must agree that it was most inappropriate. The subjective commentary about neighborhood relations was totally out of line and bore no relevance to the fact that an innocent man was beaten to a pulp by another individual. Had the victim and perpetrator been of another ethnicities, I wonder (and highly doubt) if such a comment would be tolerated.
Sounds like she was trying to quote Haman.
She probably put the noose up herself. Most highly-publicised “hate crimes” are nothing of the sort.
I would not blame her so fast I think that the lakewood police dept are behind this, when on the same report ch 11 said that the lakewood police statement sais that it was not a bias report, and this comes after the witness interview by ch 11 which she heard the the word jew this jew that being repeated while this rebbe was being beaten, so if ch 11 is accused of unfair reporting, then exsplain to me why they interviewed this wittness and put her on the air for that they show the real story and the real report koodus to ch 11 be strong and keep up the good repoting I thing you also have the best traffic graphigs the city should take nite of that thank you one of your local CW fans.