Is this the price we pay when we speak our minds and fight for what is right? Being an activist who represents the people should be viewed as a noble selfless act, but in an atmosphere filled with hate, acts of violence towards those who speak out are becoming overplayed tunes that the media has no pause button to.
At the beginning of November, the biggest story that everyone was reading about was the midterm elections, and as important as they were, they outshined the stories of violence, and that should not be the case. A story we should have never allowed to fade into the background is that of Danye Jones.
Jones was a young African-American man, the son of two activists connected to the Ferguson incidents. On Oct. 17, 2018, Jones was found dead by his mother, Melissa McKinnies, hanging from a tree behind their home.
When local police arrived at the scene, the immediate conclusion was that Jones had committed suicide by hanging. McKinnies, on the other hand, believes her son was murdered. In her eyes this was a lynching, and many suspect the same.
McKinnies, when she saw that the police were investigating her son’s death as a suicide, took it to Facebook, posting, “They lynched my baby.” Attached to that were explicit pictures of Jones hanging from a tree, and it created an uproar on social media — but apparently not enough for the major news outlets to notice.
McKinnies believes that her work as an activist is the reason for her son’s murder. She recalls getting targeted and threatened before this happened. She states that her son had no reason nor gave any hint that he would want to do this to himself.
What happened to Jones is horrible; one can only imagine what it would feel like to find someone you love hanging and no one listening to your story. Why did Twitter and Facebook alert us to this atrocity and not the news stations?
No coverage on major news outlet, no coverage on any major news channels, just small local papers to report this. Why? Is running a story about the campaign debates really taking light away from something as historically tragic as a suspected lynching? This speaks volumes as to the condition of the political parties running.
The decision of news media to highlight which party regained control of the House of Representatives trumped all other stories revealing that an atmosphere full of animosity and hate is still very much among us. How much bad news can the public take? Well, as much bad news as we have, it is important to continue reminding everyone how big this ongoing problem is in hopes that the government might act and do the right thing.
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