The Shooting of Stephon Clark: Who is to Blame?

Objectivity plays an important role in the media but is something that is very hard to achieve. While audiences expect their news coverage to be objective, often times it is not, whether consumers realize it or not. Subjectivity subtly sneaks its way into almost all media whether it be the news, Facebook, film, etc. Often times though, the subjective point of view goes unnoticed as consumers are more interested in the facts being covered than the subtle differences in what facts are being covered. A great example of this is the news coverage of the recent police shooting of 22 year old, Stephon Clark.

Stephon Clark was an unarmed black male who was fatally shot on March 18^th. According to news outlets, he was breaking into car windows causing for police response. Following his death, many questions have been raised as to whether he was a threat to police or not and whether fatally shooting him was justified. Two news outlets have covered this story but in two very different ways – Fox News and NY Times. I say that these two outlets cover the stories in two different ways because one focuses more on blaming Stephon Clark for his actions and being shot as a result while the other focuses on police action.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/04/04/stephon-clark-shooting-timeline-events.html

Fox News immediately starts their coverage out with saying that Clark disobeyed officers orders and advanced towards them causing them to shoot in self defense. They make it clear that one of the officers was black as if to void the idea that the shooting had anything to do with race but to do that so quickly raises questions. Why do they automatically assume that we, the readers, think that this was a black hate crime? Why is it so important to point out that an officer was black because the victim was black? Are they trying to cover something up or do they assume that maybe this was a racially driven crime? They are quick to jump on that which raises more questions than if they had not even said anything about race at all. Clearly, race is a factor to them in some way, shape, or form otherwise it would not have been necessary to address. As Fox recounts what happened, they note that Clark moved towards the officers with an object in his hand and the officers identified that object as a gun prompting the shooting. They mention that officers moved towards Clark and administered life saving measures but do not denote the amount of time it took them to do so. They mention that they found damaged cars and shattered glass as if to bring the point back around that Clark had been doing something wrong when he was shot. They proceed to talk about Clark’s “troubled” past and his multiple run-ins with the police including robbery and domestic battery. Fox’s point here? Clark was not a victim in this case, he was a criminal. He was a criminal then and the shattered glass and damaged windows show he was a criminal at the time of the shooting. Plain and simple.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/30/us/stephon-clark-independent-autopsy.html

The NY Times paints a bit of a different picture. While they too recount what happened that night they are quick to point out that Clark was shot in the back – a defenseless position to be shot at. He could not have been advancing towards the officers if he was facing the other way. They bring up evidence from the medical examiner who points to the shots all being fired from behind Clark. The NY Times notes that officers did not move to help Clark after shooting him for 5 minutes despite him laying there hardly moving as they could not be sure that he did not have a weapon on him. They point out that medical assistance was not given to Clark until about 6 minutes after he was shot. The same medical examiner states that it’s uncertain that medical assistance could have saved Clark but that every minute officers waited decreased his likelihood of survival. One striking difference between these two media accounts is that the NY Times does not state that Clark was advancing towards the officers but that that was their initial claim. They note that body camera footage is unclear and does not necessarily show which direction Clark was facing and that autopsy contradicted the idea that he was advancing towards them as a threat. The fact that officers continued to shoot at Clark while he was laying on his stomach brings about much doubt as to whether Clark was a threat or police were senselessly shooting at an unarmed, defenseless man. While nothing is quite clear, the bottom line here is that Clark should not have been fatally shot. To the NY Times, Clark was a victim of senseless police shooting and the police are to blame here, not Clark.

These two articles raise the question: was Clark truly a criminal like Fox believes or was he senselessly shot to death even when proven defenseless by police? Who is to blame? We might never know.

The subjectivity of these two articles is striking when compared to one another but as consumers, how often do we read differing accounts of what happened? Most of us are loyal to one news station or one news outlet and those are the facts we receive so we never really know what the other side is saying. We never truly see the subjectivity in what we are consuming because rarely do we have a comparative analysis of two news stations. The media is able to keep people divided, not by blatantly stating opinions but through the subjective addition and omission of details such as Clark’s criminal history or the findings of the autopsy that shows he was not facing officers when shot. Who do we believe when objectivity cannot be achieved?