Liberals, verified 'journalists' spread disinformation about police shooting of Makhia Bryant

In the wake of a police shooting in Columbus, Ohio, on Tuesday, activists, liberals, and journalists made a mad rush to judgement, assuming, with no evidence, that the young girl who was fatally shot was both unarmed and innocent of any wrong doing.

Body cam footage released by Columbus police show instead a young woman, Makhia Bryant, was seen with knife in hand, lunging at another young woman.

But for the liberals, activists, and many journalists, the only thing that mattered was the girl's race, and their assumptions about police.

The AP took the narrative and ran with it, not pausing for a moment to get a sense of the facts in the case, instead linking Bryant's death to the death of George Floyd.

Activist Malynda Hale questioned that Bryant had a knife at all.

Washington Post journalist Radley Balko posted the misinformation, which was liked over 300 times, but then deleted it when it turned out he had rushed to judgement.

Attorney Judith Browne Dianis also misconstrued the the circumstances of the incident.

Civil right attorney and activist Jo Kaur assumed that Bryant was murdered by police, not that police were protecting the person Bryant was threatening with a knife.

Journalist and professor used Bryant's death as a reason to say that policing cannot be reformed.

HuffPo's Philip Lewis said that Bryant was the one who needed help.

BLM Chicago reported that Bryant was murdered.

The New York Times actively engaged in the spread of misinformation, taking activist lawyer Ben Crump's tweet about Bryant's death and editing it, without making note of that edit at all. Crump said Bryant was unarmed, she wasn't. The New York Times did not honestly report what Crump said.

The ACLU, a civil liberties organization, used Bryan's death as a means to continue their activism. This only moments after a verdict was announced in the case of Derek Chauvin, who was found guilty on all counts of killing George Floyd on May 25, 2020.

The reason these activists and journalists rushed to judgement is because they believed the true events would bear similarity to the narrative they are weaving in culture. Instead of weighing the information and making reasoned judgements, they leapt first to what emotionally confirmed their own bias.

This is not merely a progressive problem.

Byrant's death doesn't confirm or disconfirm a narrative. Media bias can fuel real life action, and it it would behoove journalists to take a moment before rushing to judgement. The facts of any given circumstance are not about furthering a story journalists and activists are trying to sell, but must be told on their own merits.