I don’t know what’s up with the comments at Fox News’ website. I rarely visit the site and I had never looked at the comments in any of their articles until the Trayvon Martin case became national news. I have to be honest, though. Their comments aren’t just racist. It’s like a competition to see who can make the most racist comment possible. I have occasionally skimmed white supremacist forums. I don’t like to do it because I worry that I’ll wind up under surveillance. But the few times I’ve checked those forums, they’ve been a lot more substantive and thoughtful about their racism than anything you see at Fox.
What do I mean by that? They actually have conversations about things and debate issues. They engage with each other and respond to what other people are saying. They may be interpreting everything in a really racist or anti-Semitic way, but they’re strategizing about how to do things. Maybe they’re focused on enacting stricter immigration laws or winning over new recruits or getting some of their folks elected. But it’s a forum. It’s a forum that isn’t 100% pointless.
And don’t get me wrong. I know that the comments sections of newspapers are notorious for their stupidity and hatred. But none of them that I’ve seen even begin to compare to what I’ve seen at Fox News in the last two weeks.
As I see it, there are two problems here. The first is that Fox News is clearly attracting a virulently racist online audience. The second is that they are not doing enough to monitor their threads. Fox News wants to sell advertising. That’s their business model. If they don’t clean up this mess, we just might make sure transcripts of these Trayvon Martin threads are emailed to every corporate board with a teevee advertising budget in the country, every newspaper, every congressman, and to the dreaded crew at MSNBC.
If they don’t clean it up, it must mean that they want to be one of the most racist forums in the country.
