Concern with article and lack of contact info for editor.
I am concerned with the article written by one of your sports columnists titled, "My hopes that George Floyd's murder would impact change for Black lives are fading like paint on the street". I believe it has many misleading statements that should not have been allowed in a news story that appears on the Yahoo home page.
"...very few substantive things happened to change a system of policing that was partly borne of patrolling slaves":
Our policing system was not borne of "patrolling slaves". The history of policing has roots in ancient Rome and, more recently, England in the 1600's with the first constables. Northern colonies had constables in the 1600's as well.
The Metropolitan Police Act in 1829 created the first modern police force in the U.K. and laid the groundwork for Boston, New York and Philadelphia's police departments, which influenced future police forces in the U.S. These (Northern) city police departments, formed to keep the peace and deter crime, had nothing to do with "patrolling slaves". As far as I can tell, Young got her idea from Rep. James Clyburn - a politician, not a historian.
"...so we can see so many of the interactions that police typically lie about on their reports."
Here, Young does not provide a citation or additional examples that would substantiate the statement that police "typically lie about" in-custody deaths. She cites the George Floyd example, which cites the initial release of Floyd's death, but not the incident report, which she says is where police "typically lie". There is no example of a "lie" in a police report.
"Police killings haven't stopped, and indeed nearly 1,000 other people have been killed by agents of the state since the day Floyd was murdered. "
Here, Young seems to suggest that "police killings" should stop as a result of the murder of George Floyd, as if there is no reason why police should be allowed to use deadly force. The "1000 other people" figure does not break down the number of people that were armed and/or had the intent on doing the police/innocent civilians harm (the vast majority). It seems to ignore that police routinely respond to violent incidents tasked with protecting victims from violent individuals who occasionally pose a deadly threat to the responding officers. To suggest that no situations exist for police to be able to use deadly force is misleading and irresponsible.
"Across the country, local governments are so bothered by what they're seeing that they are outright banning education on this country's true history. Though Nikole Hannah-Jones, the brilliant New York Times journalist, gifted us all the 1619 Project nearly two years ago in an attempt to reframe the United States' national narrative in the context of the treatment and contributions of Black Americans, backlash toward it continues and seems to be growing stronger. Not only has Hannah-Jones been targeted personally, cities and states are passing legislation to prevent the teaching of that body of work."
The 1619 project is not "true history". It has not passed peer-review from historians in the field and has in fact received large amounts of criticism from historians who have studied these topics for their whole careers. Hannah-Jones has an undergraduate degree in history. Her master's is in journalism. To suggest that the 1619 project should be the basis for history taught to primary students is laughable. One of the premises of the article (the American Revolution was fought to preserve slavery) is not compatible with historical fact and ignores the much more interesting context of the time period during which our nation was founded. There were no imminent plans for Britain outlaw slavery in her colonies and the founders do not write about the urgent need to preserve slavery in the founding documents. I am astounded that Young would suggest that an editorial piece published by the New York Times should serve as a reference source for public school education. Hannah-Jones generalizes her critics as "old, white male historians", as if that constitutes an argument against their well-researched critiques. Imagine if one of these historians used this same argument against Hannah-Jones (with the race/gender changed) as their only basis for criticizing her position.
I believe these statements (and others) that appear in this article jeopardize journalistic integrity. I am also disappointed that there is no easy way to write to an editor on your site. Now more than ever, I believe it is the journalist's duty to strictly adhere to well-researched facts in order to preserve the legitimacy of the free press we enjoy in this country.
Wil Robbins
shared this idea