White folks, don't bother asking for a 1 on 1 interview
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As Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot approaches the two-year anniversary of her inauguration, reaching the halfway point through her first term, she told the city's media outlets that she would grant one-on-one interviews to mark the occasion, but with one condition: she will only speak with journalists of color.
"I ran to break up the status quo that was failing so many. That isn't just in City Hall," Lightfoot tweeted Wednesday morning. "It's a shame that in 2021, the City Hall press corps is overwhelmingly White in a city where more than half of the city identifies as Black, Latino, AAPI or Native American."
"Diversity and inclusion is imperative across all institutions including media. In order to progress we must change," she continued. "This is exactly why I'm being intentional about prioritizing media requests from POC reporters on the occasion of the two-year anniversary of my inauguration as mayor of this great city."
Lightfoot called the racial make-up of the City Hall press corps "an imbalance that needs to change," adding that Chicago's local media "should reflect the multiple cultures that comprise it."
While some on social media responded to Lightfoot's tweets Wednesday praising the move as "equity" and a step forward in representation, many others criticized the decision.
Chicago Tribune reporter Gregory Pratt was among those disagreeing with the policy.
"I am a Latino reporter @chicagotribune whose interview request was granted for today," Pratt tweeted. "However, I asked the mayor’s office to lift its condition on others and when they said no, we respectfully canceled. Politicians don’t get to choose who covers them."
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Sue the ever-loving crap out of her. It is illegal for her to discriminate on the basis of race.
The Brad
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Sue the ever-loving crap out of her. It is illegal for her to discriminate on the basis of race.
@lufins-dad said in White folks, don't bother asking for a 1 on 1 interview:
Sue the ever-loving crap out of her.
Considering how things work these days, who would have standing to sue? A reporter who identifies as "white?"
What about people like Rachel Dolezal?
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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There may be further developments to this story. There are headlines from around announcing 'backlash' to Lightfoot's idiocy. Places like The Hill and Daily Mail, Fox, NY Post. The sites I clicked into, the header was the only mention: 'There is backlash'. The rest is rehash.
ETA: They weren't all rehash, but new material was mostly commentary by various PO'd journalists. Sorry to mislead.
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I love stuff like this. It might shock us back to reality.
I am by no means a white supremacist but if you back me up to a wall I will be joining my tribe for the fight.
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I love stuff like this. It might shock us back to reality.
I am by no means a white supremacist but if you back me up to a wall I will be joining my tribe for the fight.
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@lufins-dad said in White folks, don't bother asking for a 1 on 1 interview:
Sue the ever-loving crap out of her.
Considering how things work these days, who would have standing to sue? A reporter who identifies as "white?"
What about people like Rachel Dolezal?
@george-k said in White folks, don't bother asking for a 1 on 1 interview:
who would have standing to sue?
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Sue the ever-loving crap out of her. It is illegal for her to discriminate on the basis of race.
@lufins-dad said in White folks, don't bother asking for a 1 on 1 interview:
Sue the ever-loving crap out of her. It is illegal for her to discriminate on the basis of race.
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Lightfoot says she would 'absolutely' exclude white journalists again
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said she would "absolutely" grant interviews only to journalists of color again after she drew waves of backlash earlier in the year when she announced the policy.
"I would absolutely do it again. I’m unapologetic about it because it spurred a very important conversation, a conversation that needed to happen, that should have happened a long time ago," the Democrat said on a segment of the New York Times's podcast Sway, released on Monday.
"Here is the bottom line for me: To state the obvious, I’m a black woman mayor," she said. "I’m the mayor of the third-largest city in the country. Obviously, I have a platform, and it’s important to me to advocate on things that I believe are important. Going back to why I ran — to disrupt the status quo. The media is critically important to our democracy. … The media is in a time of incredible upheaval and disruption, but our City Hall press corps looks like it’s 1950 or 1970."
When Lightfoot was pressed on the subject and reminded of criticism from those who suggested politicians don't get to choose their coverage, she remained defiant and said the move was meant to resist "systemic racism."
"No, it’s not about me choosing who covers me, right? I gave exclusive interviews," the mayor said. "And we do get to choose who we talk to in exclusives. I gave exclusive interviews with journalists of color, right? One 24-hour period and it was like people’s heads exploded. I had journalists saying, ‘Does the mayor think I’m racist?’ No, it’s not about individuals. It’s about systemic racism."
"I am a Latino reporter [at the Chicago Tribune] whose interview request was granted for today," reporter Gregory Pratt tweeted. "However, I asked the mayor’s office to lift its condition on others and when they said no, we respectfully canceled. Politicians don’t get to choose who covers them."
Similarly, NBC 5 political reporter Mary Ann Ahern told the Washington Examiner, "I expressed my outrage. Nothing has changed."
