The Continuing Saga of the Jena Six: Charges Reduced, But Not Dropped

Posted by Samhita Mukhopadhyay at 5:19 AM on September 5, 2007.

This post, written by Samhita, originally appeared on Feministing

UPDATE: For more on this story, click here.

I have failed to write about the Jena 6 case in Louisiana, as have most mainstream news outlets and mainstream blogs. Shame on me, but lucky for you, I stumbled upon this video that sums up what happened quite well, so please watch and take action ASAP.

Nooses are a prank? Can we say Jim Crow? Clearly, the MSM doesn't even know where to begin since this is such a clear display of racism. Granted there is an over generalization that racism happens more so in the South, even though racist shit happens everywhere, so perhaps we want to cover the story in a more balanced manner, thinking about the national state of race relations. However, it is pertinent that the use of a noose to intimidate a group of young black students is at the least horridly offensive, but more like, threatening and attempting to put some black kids in their place using an object that is both historically and geographically relevant.

And I like the apt comparison he draws between mass media coverage of the supposedly wrongly done Duke Lax players, while Mychal Bell, a 16 year old, rots in jail and gets sentenced to 22 years with little to no coverage in MSM. One of the key arguments made by feminist and POC bloggers in response to the Duke case was that the coverage and the treatment of those men would be different if they were black. As we can clearly see, this is true. Where is the outrage about this? Why isn't FOX news or some of the conservative blogs making noise and demanding justice?

Well we can still make some noise. This is the petition mentioned in the film and you can sign another petition at Color of Change. Also while you are it, call your local paper and your local TV station and demand they do more coverage on the Jena 6 case.

Also, as of earlier today, the charges against two of the young men have been reduced.

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Tagged as: race, racism, jena six

Samhita Mukhopadhyay is an editor for Feministing. She is also is the Training and Technology Coordinator at Youth Media Council.