The fire department, race and ghosts
Thursday we published a story on the front page about Greensboro firefighters doing work at the fire chief's houses. It didn't take long on the Debatables blog for some commenters to see racial politics behind it.
Alas, a mention of race is nowhere to be found in Thursday's article or Friday's. But that hasn't stopped some readers from imagining it. (That, and for blaming us for writing about the story in the first place.) I don't know if there is a racial angle to the things happening at the fire department, but I know that we haven't reported on one. The chief, by the way, is white, for whatever that fact is worth.
At the same time, Skeet Club Savage, a frequent commenter on this blog and several others, started an interesting comment thread on my Sunday newspaper column post.
He (I'm assuming Skeet Club is male) and I spar in a long back-and-forth about our coverage of the police department issues. It is worth reading. If you've been following this blog for any length of time, you probably know that some people think this newspaper made the upheaval in the PD a racial issue. I've resisted that characterization because I think it's imprecise, if not inaccurate.
We reported on the divisiveness in the department. We reported on the "black book," a document that alarmed some officials and city employees. We reported on some of the operational problems within the department. Some people in and out of the police department saw racial angles, no question. In any case, I've encouraged people read our coverage fresh, rather than rely on their memories or what they have read elsewhere. It takes a good degree of intellectual rigor. To his immense credit, Skeet Club Savage did.
Skeet begins: John, "yes or no" question: Do you thing (sic) a reasonable person reading Lorraine Ahearns "black book" / tracking device column may conclude that David Wray was a racist?
After several exchanges, he concludes: It appears I was referring to the lengthly article of 1/12/06 about the black book etc. After reading this and several other of the articles it appears that I have falsely accused Lorraine of injecting personal bias into the articles.
I suppose one could argue that the headline "Covert Tactics Brought Down Chief' was kind of silly because finding suspected crooked cops has to be covert. Are the investigating officers supposed to announce they are investigating then ride along in the car with the suspects?
It appears I was caught up in the hysteria like many others. I think I was feeling some type of collective effect since, along with the articles of 2/19 and 4/23, it seemed they all detailed the case against Wray and not much in his favor. The reason for this may simply be because Wray was not talking at that time (which begat the Rhino series.)
Nevertheless, each article taken individually shows the accusation of bias against Lorriane (sic) is unfounded and therefore I have to say you got me on this one, John
I would also like to apologize to Lorraine.
I have a lot of respect for Skeet Club because he took the time to go back and read our coverage. And then he had the courage to make his own independent judgment. I wasn't trying to get him. I was simply trying to pin down this ghost of our role in making the story about race.
And I'm hoping the fire department story doesn't evoke the same ghosts.
Comments (1)
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You sir are the one who digs up the ghost.
N&R loves it. How long will it take you to figure out that folks don't care about the past in Greensboro. Get on with building the future of the city. I sometimes wonder what city i'm in.
I've been here 65 years and the crap I read in your paper is not what I see on the street.
Posted on February 25, 2008 6:54 AM