T&A bias

Which of these is a more important news story?

A) Unhealthy amounts of smoke and soot covered much of Metro Atlanta for several hours yesterday due to a forest fire.

B) Two vaguely attractive white girls were caught on camera robbing somebody.

Answer: Obviously, A. In addition to unnerving people, the smoke made breathing more difficult for people with respiratory ailments. And at least one aircraft (11 Alive's traffic helicopter) was forced to land due to poor visibility.

Now.

Which story, A or B, was the lead story in today's AJC?

Answer: Obviously, B. Why? Because the news media is unheathily focused on the activities and/or plight of vaguely attractive, white women.

I'm sick of phony dialogue about liberal or conservative bias in the news media. The media's strongest bias, and the bias that's most damaging to the public, is the bias toward covering unimportant stories about vaguely attractive, middle-to-upper middle class white women.

I've got nothing against white women. Some of my best friends are white women. I live with a white woman! I'm just angryfrustratedsick of non-stories getting blanket coverage just because one of the people involved is white, female and not poor-looking.

According the AJC the "girls-next-door" heist has "captivated" the nation.

Girls-next-door is a news media code word. It means white, well-off and attractive without being overly sexed-up. It's time for the everyone with a brain to retire that phrase. Does everyone, or even most people, in the "nation" live next-door to upper-middle class white girls? I think not. That such a transparently stupid and racist phrase would appear in a story credited to "AIXA M. PASCUAL, YOLANDA RODRIGUEZ" is especially off-putting.

The other code word used by the AJC in its coverage is "captivate". "Captivate" is the AJC's way of apologizing for putting the story on the front page. "We'd rather report on the City Council, but it's just that the story has 'captivated' so many of you that we have no choice but to cover it as if it is the most important story in Metro Atlanta today."

If you're gonna put such a stupid story on the front page, at least have the courage to admit what you're doing.