Monday 15 December 2008

Who killed Jose Sucuzhanay?


Various news sources in America report the tragic death of Ecuadorian Jose Sucuzhanay in New York, as the result of what was allegedly a hate crime. Mr Sucuzhanay's death has caused hundreds of people to demonstrate against hate crimes and there are various reports of a growing number of racially motivated attacks on Hispanic migrants, including the Ecuadorian community in New York.

According to some reports, the hate involved in Mr Sucuzhanay's murder was both racist and homophobic, as various media outlets are consistent in reporting that the victim and his brother were walking arm in arm and were accosted by three males who seemingly mistook them for being gay and attacked the brothers shouting abusive remarks about both gays and Hispanics. The brother managed to escape, but Jose Sucuzanay was beaten to death.

If the facts as alleged are correct, it certainly sounds as if the murder meets the definition of a hate crime, and again the media is consistent in implying that this may be the case. However, most of them are also remarkably consistent in failing to provide any meaningful information about the suspects other than their gender.

For example CNN states that “several men approached [the brothers] in a car” that great institution of the blinkered left The New York Times reports that “Three men jumped out of a maroon or red sport utility vehicle and attacked the brothers”, a report which, at least, mentions the colour of the car, and indeed the NY Times goes on to say the police had “released a description of the attackers", and goes so far as to mention the colour of his (black) leather jacket. However, as to the colour of his skin, in common with almost everyone else, the so called American Newspaper of record remains silent.

Elsewhere the Associated press simply tells us that the Sucuzanay brothers were “accosted on a Brooklyn street by men”.

Certainly the news media all tell us that the attackers were “men”, which I suppose excludes women, children and, of course, Himalayan Yaks as potential suspects. Also, as they all seem to agree that the murder was probably racially motivated, I guess they are, by implication, excluding Hispanics, at least Ecuadorians, from the frame.

So what are we, as readers to think?, or should I say, what do they want us to think? I guess that those who read this blog could hazard quite an astute guess, but then, few of you are likely to be average readers of New York's prestigious “Grey Lady”.

The clue, of course is that no race is mentioned at all, and most certainly had the attackers been of European origin, that would have been prominently reported, and probably included in the headline.

CNN, to its unexpected credit, drops a hint as to the ethnicity of the suspects by stating that the victim had been racially inclusive and had employed “a diverse team, including four African-Americans”, although I imagine most of their readers would have missed the subtlety.

However it is not until we get to the far less prestigious publication, the New York Daily News do we find a news source prepared to describe the attackers as “three black men” and then goes so far as show us a police sketch of one of the suspects below:


At least the readers of the New York Daily News are unlikely to be wasting police time by reporting possible Japanese, Inuit or, for that matter, white suspects to them.

However, what about those who rely for their news on the major mainstream news sources, they presumably will remain in ignorance as to the race of the suspected murderers of Jose Sucuzhanay and, may indeed be unaware of the increasing levels of racial violence between blacks and Hispanics.

Indeed given the levels which so many main stream US media sources, such as for instance, CNN, the New York Times and the Associated press have gone to in recent decades to perpetuate the myth that hate crimes are exclusively perpetrated by whites, they could be forgiven for assuming that Jose Sucuzhanay's killers were white.

This is another example of what I Anne Coulter once referred to as “lying by omission”, also, I believe, in relation to the New York Times. It is clearly by deliberate act that so many media sources have omitted the words “black” or African American, from their reports. Their main motive for doing this is to disguise the level of racially motivated crime committed by non-whites in America. However, beyond that, by actively reporting the attack as a “hate crime”, whilst hiding the fact that the suspects are non white, they are effectively misleading their readers into thinking that the perpetrators were white.

That too, I suspect, is deliberate. A lie as Anne Coulter might put it, a cynical and dangerous lie, but, as we all know, from the MSM that is nothing new.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

TO CONTACT JOSE O. SUCUZHANAY
FAMILY PLEASE SEND AN E-MAIL AT
Sucuzhanay@Gmail.com
PLEASE HELP US FIND
OUR BROTHER'S KILLERS.
Sincerely,
Diego Sucuzhanay and all The sucuzhanay family

Help resolve Hate crimes in New York before there's another victim.