The New York Times: Black NoVa Girl Says White Private School Classmates Cut Her Dreadlocks

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Terrible thing if this happened, and unfortunately there are many instances of bullying every day of thousands of kids that are never broadcast on the news. But yes, there should be no rush to judgment. At this point, it is an allegation by a girl whose family has chosen to put her in front of TV cameras. We'll see how it evolves.

I haven't been on this thread or followed this story for several days, but glad I held my powder above from the start. It was suspicious from the start for many of the reasons posted above and for others. The truth is that the media used to be very careful about reporting crime -- always referring to "alleged perpetrators" even when they had eyewitnesses. Now with no witnesses and just an alleged victim -- before there is any investigation at all -- the media is wiling to sensationalize and assume guilt until proven innocent - especially if they can play up a race or gender element. This is one of the by-products of the me too movement having gone too far. If any claimed victim is "presumed" to be telling the truth, by definition her accused is "presumed guilty" in the court of public opinion I'm not arguing that there aren't horrible people -- men overwhelmingly -- that assault women and girls all too often and have gotten away with it for far too long. There are and they have. But I am arguing that as a society we have to decide whether an uncorroborated allegation alone will be sufficient to take down a potentially innocent person in the court of public opinion -- be expelled from school, fired from a job, and land in the center of calls for condemnation amplified by careless journalism. I am sure that there are far fewer false allegations that truthful ones, but I suspect as people discover that they have a new-found power to bring down someone with an uncorroborated allegation, there numbers of false ones will increase. Unfortunately, several of these incidents that have received the most media attention have proven to be false, but the media keeps rushing for a story and the public is keeps eating it up without regard for evidence.

The US media has become a sensationalistic partisan propaganda machine.

Will take them a while to recover, if ever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I liked the apology. I hope it was sincere.

Would you be saying the same thing if the boy’s lawyer posted an apology?

Doubtful

I would hope anyone’s apology would be sincere. Are you saying the boys should apologize for something?

[Anonymous]

I was one of the posters who said this didn’t sound right because 12-year-old white boys don’t know and use the word “nappy.” Several posters jumped on me for daring to speak about something I knew nothing of as a white person. I would like an apology too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
In the original headline of the NYTimes, the race of the kids was in the headline. Guess what was omitted from the story today?

Original story was top of front page on washingtonpost.com. The hoax update? Buried in the local sub-section.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
In the original headline of the NYTimes, the race of the kids was in the headline. Guess what was omitted from the story today?

Original story was top of front page on washingtonpost.com. The hoax update? Buried in the local sub-section.

Wow.

Just ...... wow.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was one of the posters who said this didn’t sound right because 12-year-old white boys don’t know and use the word “nappy.” Several posters jumped on me for daring to speak about something I knew nothing of as a white person. I would like an apology too.

Yeah, I hope you're not holding your breath or anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That girl has been punished enough for lying, lying as all kids do. Stop piling on.

On the contrary, there's absolutely nothing on the record that suggests she's been punished in any way whatsoever, at all.

Let's just stick with the facts, shall we? And it's a FACT that you have NO IDEA if she's been punished, let alone "enough".

[Anonymous]

Can’t believe how many on camera recordings she and her grandma did on this, lying through their teeth.

Must have been quite the weekend deciding what to do once the investigators/police called BS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
In the original headline of the NYTimes, the race of the kids was in the headline. Guess what was omitted from the story today?

Original story was top of front page on washingtonpost.com. The hoax update? Buried in the local sub-section.

Well, now we know.

The whole paper is a hoax.

[Anonymous]

The girl should be expelled. If the boys did anything like that they would be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The girl should be expelled. If the boys did anything like that they would be.

+1

[Anonymous]

I couldn't tell where her hair has been cut in the before and after photos. Did she cut her own hair or there was never any hair that was cut? Maybe she is tired off the dreadlocks and wants them cut off. There are some nice looking dreadlocks but hers just look dirty and look like from the beginning when she started growing them someone didn't take care of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The girl should be expelled. If the boys did anything like that they would be.

There is no way she can return to this school. Not even just as "punishment" but for her own sake. The other kids will not want to associate with her.

And for those saying that the lying is no big deal and "she's been punished enough"--do you have ANY idea what the last several days must have been like for those boys and their families? I imagine they were terrified that their names would soon be "leaked" and the public harassment they would face...Remember the Covington boys back in January? A case of mistaken identity meant that one kid who WASN'T EVEN THERE had his name and photo blasted over the internet, his intended college harassed with demands to not enroll him, and his extended family and family's business "doxed." When the REAL person was identified it was even worse, with celebrities publicly encouraging violence against him!

Have you ever been falsely accused of something? It is a excruciating feeling and experience and I am sure this past weekend for the boys and their families has been life altering. This whole situation is sick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
In the original headline of the NYTimes, the race of the kids was in the headline. Guess what was omitted from the story today?

Original story was top of front page on washingtonpost.com. The hoax update? Buried in the local sub-section.

Wow.

Just ...... wow.

For those outraged about the headline juxtaposition, this is the very *first* paragraph of the recanting story (emphasis added):

The police in Northern Virginia are investigating a report by a black 12-year-old girl that three white boys in her grade held her down, covered her mouth and cut off lengths of her dreadlocks on a playground at their private Christian school.


Not really hidden about that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
In the original headline of the NYTimes, the race of the kids was in the headline. Guess what was omitted from the story today?

Original story was top of front page on washingtonpost.com. The hoax update? Buried in the local sub-section.

Wow.

Just ...... wow.

For those outraged about the headline juxtaposition, this is the very *first* paragraph of the recanting story (emphasis added):

The police in Northern Virginia are investigating a report by a black 12-year-old girl that three white boys in her grade held her down, covered her mouth and cut off lengths of her dreadlocks on a playground at their private Christian school.


Not really hidden about that.

PP here. Sorry, I copied and pasted the first paragraph from the initial story, not from the updated story. Here's the lead paragraph from the updated story:

It was a story bound to unleash a storm of news coverage: A black 12-year-old girl reported that three white boys had pinned her down in a school playground and cut off her dreadlocks.


The point stands, though.