After an illegal migrant named Jose Medina-Medina murdered Loyola University Chicago freshman Sheridan Gorman, there was plenty of blame to go around. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson could have apologized for opposing ICE’s efforts to get illegal migrants out of the city, and for allowing Chicago to become so overrun with criminals.
Loyola University officials could have apologized for giving parents and students the impression that it was safe to be in the area. Loyola University professors could have apologized for demonizing efforts to stop illegal migration as “racist.” All of these people should have apologized to Sheridan Gorman’s parents, for the horror and tragedy of it all.
And as it happened, Loyola University’s campus newspaper, The Phoenix, did indeed apologize, but not for any of those things. Instead, it offered an apology to Jose Medina-Medina, the man who murdered Sheridan Gorman. And here now I want to type “Yes, you read that right,” because it is so horrifically unbelievable, but I find myself wanting to type that in every article I write these days, and so I will resist the temptation. But yes, you did read that right. Loyola’s student paper offered an apology to the man who just murdered a Loyola University student.
The College Fix reported Wednesday that Jose Medina-Medina, “an illegal immigrant from Venezuela, allegedly killed Gorman while the student was hanging out with friends at a nearby beach early on the morning of March 19.” When the news of the murder came to light, The Phoenix published a post on Instagram with this headline: “Immigrant Man Charged in Murder of Sheridan Gorman, DHS Involved.”
It was all true. Jose Medina-Medina is indeed an “immigrant man.” He is also an “illegal immigrant,” which is what The Phoenix’s story called him. He was indeed charged with murdering Sheridan Gorman. The Department of Homeland Security is involved.
Nevertheless, the woke are out in force at Loyola University Chicago, as they are on college and university campuses all over the country, and so the concern immediately turned away from the victim and her grieving parents, and to the well-being of the poor murderer, whose poor widda feewings may have been hurt. After a “backlash,” The Phoenix “edited the post to remove the term ‘illegal immigrant.’”
The version of The Phoenix’s story about the murder now refers to Medina as a “Rogers Park resident.” Rogers Park is the Chicago neighborhood where Jose Medina-Medina lives. The story does acknowledge that “the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said Medina is from Venezuela and was living in the United States illegally.” But now the same story also carries a long-winded editor’s note that tries to avert the wrath of the dumb and leftist:
Editor’s Note:
On March 23, a post on The Phoenix’s Instagram page carried the following headline: “Immigrant Man Charged in Murder of Sheridan Gorman, DHS Involved.”
That headline didn’t reflect the most important elements in the story, and it was taken down minutes later to prevent any further harm to affected community members.
Additionally, in the body of the original post, we described the man who was charged as an “illegal immigrant,” using language provided by the Department of Homeland Security. That language does not align with Associated Press style, nor does it align with the values of this newspaper.
No human’s existence is illegal, and we quickly changed our wording to reflect that.
We acknowledge the harm such language can cause and the power and importance of the words we choose to use. We deeply regret these errors, and we’re committed to continuing the high standards we hold for ourselves as journalists and members of the Loyola, Rogers Park and Chicago communities.
So it’s all on record now. The Phoenix acknowledges “the harm such language can cause and the power and importance of the words we choose to use,” but it does not acknowledge the horror of the murder of Sheridan Gorman, or the harm that illegal immigration can cause.
For leftists, the number of people their policies end up killing doesn’t matter in the slightest degree. What matters is that those policies are implemented. Leftists in America today, being socialist internationalists, want the U.S. to have open borders, as a prelude to its becoming a central element of the socialist internationalist and authoritarian megastate they want to construct. In the service of attaining that goal, it is important that people realize how to speak about immigration in a way that the left approves. It is not important that illegal immigrants murder people.
Loyola University’s Phoenix thus reflects, in microcosm, the malady that afflicts the nation, and all of the Western world. Only by resolutely rejecting this sinister agenda will we be able to place the focus definitively back where it should be: on the protection of the innocent and the punishment of criminals.
