Thursday morning, the tabloid newspaper’s front page featured a huge photo of two young men with backpacks, with the giant headline: “Bag Men: Feds seek these two pictured at Boston Marathon.”
In the online story, the pair’s faces had big red circles around them. Yes, sort of like targets. Turns out, the young men had nothing to do with the blasts. After an appropriate hail of criticism, Post Editor Col Allan, incredibly, defended his decision to smear two innocent men. And yes, that was a smear.
By making a lame pun about their backpacks, the Post leaped past any kind of journalistic restraint and implied the men were suspects in the case. How could you read the photo and the giant headline any other way?
Claims feed into stereotypes and affirm our worst prejudices. A Saudi Arabian kid running from the blast must be the suspect. A couple of swarthy backpack-toting kids watching the race must be the suspects. The New York Post promulgated both those stories.
The full article is available here
