PROTEST NEEDS SOME CONTEST: ON RACISM AND NEWS DECISIONS

Protesters gathered at 301 Broadway Monday afternoon. The Southeast Missourian building was constructed at that location in 1925, and the protest yesterday was not the first there ... and it won't be the last.

A community newspaper that does its job comes closer to indispensability than it ever will to popularity, and the editor of that newspaper, whose function it is to frequently say "no," accepts the fact that being well liked is not written in the job description.

Still, Monday's protest grates just a bit. It deserves an explanation.

A couple of weeks ago, the Southeast Missourian and other media organizations in Cape Girardeau were alerted to a planned protest in front of a soon-to-be-opened business. A sign at that site offended the protesters; painted above the establishment's door was a hobo who was black.

A Southeast Missourian photographer was dispatched to the business, absent any expectations on what might occur. We are taught as newspaper people not to pre-judge a story. If a thousand people showed up to protest, I wanted the bases covered.

As it turned out, a thousand people did not show up. The number was more like a dozen and perhaps as high as 15 at any one point. The photographer took some pictures, talked to some protesters and reported back to the office.

The assembly of a daily news product is not the same as, say, the assembly of an automobile. With a news product, the parts are never standard and always changing. Dozens of decisions are made in its production. Time, space, staffing and the ebb and flow of other news events all play a part in these decisions.

On this given evening, during which I happened to be on duty, I elected not to run a photograph of the protesters. This is known in the trade as an editorial decision and I make thousands each year.

When I stepped outside the door of the Southeast Missourian Monday afternoon unbeckoned but interested in the protesters' concerns I was told this decision was racist.

Here is how a dictionary in my office defines racism: "The notion that one's ethnic stock is superior." Is a painted picture of a black hobo racist? Without knowing the intent of those who had it painted, I can't say. Is it insensitive? Absolutely, and certainly not shrewd promotion for a new business. (The offending portrait has since been painted over.)

Thus, on the essential matter involved here, I am not in disagreement with those who protested. But there is a progression of thought I find disturbing. The protesters say the decision not to run the photograph was racist. It was not an institutional judgment; I made the decision. Therefore, am I racist?

At the time I decided against giving news space to this photograph, was it my belief that my ethnic stock was superior?

Clearly, the protesters I talked to on the sidewalk in front of the Southeast Missourian Monday believed this. They are wrong.

Like any of God's creatures, I am fallible. At times I want for good judgment. Even when my judgment is good, I can make mistakes. While it is possible to learn more about my job and work harder at it, there is one thing I can't change: I am white.

And if I can never see racism in the same way a black person can, then I can at least pledge to be fair as possible in the way news is presented in this newspaper.

I have some history in this regard. For 11 years, I wrote a column of personal commentary.

On Aug. 27, 1987, I wrote this about a luncheon celebrating the opening of the Show Me Center: The school's 1986-87 basketball media guide shows that 10 of the 12 Indian players last year were black. Yet fewer than that number of blacks were present in the audience to hear the ongoing testimonials to the team and its new home. (In looking over the large room, I, in fact, spotted no blacks who weren't serving food, but I assume there had to be at least a couple there.) Of the three dozen honored guests who sat at the long head table, not one was black.

On Oct. 4, 1989, I wrote this about a request by the Ku Klux Klan in North Carolina to participate in an adopt-a-highway program: Here's a hint for the North Carolina transportation folks: Advise the Invisible Empire Knights their generous offer is rejected and that if roadside garbage is their concern, the Knights should stay off the roadside.

On April 24, 1992, I wrote this about the withdrawal of former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke from the presidential race: In a bit of laughable spin control, Duke informed the press his campaign went nowhere because he started it too late.

Well, yeah ... about 140 years too late.

... (He said), "I don't think the American people see me as a racist." He doesn't yet get it.

These are my thoughts. They are on the record. You can look them up.

When I spoke to the protesters Monday afternoon, I reminded them that this newspaper accepts letters to The Public Mind and essays for Be Our Guest, and their grievances might be aired in those columns. The response I got twice to this invitation was, "What good would that do?"

The protesters insisted they would return to the building every day until a photograph of their original protest is published. A television camera showed up at Monday's protest, and after it left, the persons holding the signs were gone a short time later. They got what they wanted. That is some formula: Protest, then protest those who don't publicize the first protest.

And the only person who assigned a photographer to the first protest (no other news organization bothered) is held up as a lightning rod for racism.

My generation is accepting of protests. The generation that preceded mine found them noble. If people want to protest my news decisions, that is their right.

And if you see these protesters in front of the Southeast Missourian building, consider their criticisms in the context provided here.

Ken Newton is editor of the Southeast Missourian.