“Denver Post Stealth Edits Out ‘Socialist’ from Profile of Arapahoe School Shooter,” Noah Rothman writes at Mediaite:
On Friday, Colorado’s Arapahoe High School was put on lockdown while a student armed with a shotgun took over the school in an attempt to confront a teacher who he believed had wronged him. The student, identified as 18-year-old Karl Pierson, took his own life before he could be taken into custody.
In a profile on the shooter in the Denver Post which focused on his “strong political beliefs,” several of Pierson’s classmates offered their impressions of the shooter. One of the shooter’s classmates described him as a “very opinionated socialist.” Shortly after that post was published, however, that description was edited out. The current copy simply describes him as “very opinionated.”
In 2012, Gabriel Malor wrote, “The media’s habitual blaming of the political right is endemic and incurable. Media figures sincerely believe the right wing is violent, so naturally assume that violent people must be right-wing. This won’t be the last time they make that mistake.”
And it wasn’t — Malor quotes himself at the bottom of a new post today, titled “The Tweetable Guide To Media Myths And Left-wing Violence,” rounding up numerous examples of the media either inventing a rightwing boogieman when a murder — particularly a gun-related murder — occurs, or as with the Denver Post, airbrushing evidence if the suspect is on the left, or both.
Yet another example that those who inhabit the elite media are just as prone to conspiracy theories as any fringe group — except that it’s worse: the MSM, which typically holds itself out to be objective, knows better. But when you’ve got a hard left agenda to push and/or a readership you hope to keep in the cocoon, straight reporting quickly goes out the door.
More pushback at Twitchy.
Update: The AP wire adds, “Students said Pierson held communist views and liked to discuss current events and issues, offering his own solutions. None said Pierson was bullied for his beliefs.” That’s buried 11 paragraphs deep into their article, but at least it’s there, unlike the Denver Post.
More: Denver Post editor attempts to dissemble the rationale behind their edit, fails badly.
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