Blog | Gunfire, destroyed property after Ohio State win. Is a “riot” only a riot when black people do it?
When is a riot not a riot? When is it little more than a nuisance no one should pay much attention to?
Related: Cops use pepper spray and tear gas after gunfire and fires unleashed after Ohio State victory
That’s the question at the heart of this post: One Tweet Shows the Hypocrisy of America's Reaction to White People Rioting at Ohio State
From that piece:
The rhetoric is particularly striking given the responses of media outlets to past events. For instance, five months earlier a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, killed an unarmed teenager. Residents of that city, which is 67% black , took to the streets in protest, demanding accountability from a law enforcement apparatus that had disproportionately targeted them for years. One fire was lit, burning down a convenience store. Yet the media referred to the events in Ferguson as "riots," and their participants as "rioters." Meanwhile, the broader conversation around the incident shifted toward shaming these people, dismissing them as " thugs " and " savages " and criticizing them for "destroying their own communities."
The author provides many examples, not just what happened earlier this week after Ohio State University won the first college football playoffs.
Does he have a point?
This story was originally published January 14, 2015 at 2:39 PM with the headline "Blog | Gunfire, destroyed property after Ohio State win. Is a “riot” only a riot when black people do it? ."