Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tptacek | Hacker News Reader

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I do not like being manipulated by journalists abusing their positions to push their preferred narrative.

Solnit would like us to believe Snow was complicit in Nieto's killing, because it supports her narrative.

Surely Solnit was made aware, before this article was published, of critically important details, like Nieto's diagnosed and medicated psychosis (he was off his meds), or his record of having violently confronted people in that same park. She chose to leave those details out of her story, entirely, because it would have muddied the point she hoped to make.

Meanwhile, Solnit is perfectly happy to write the story in such a way that a casual reader would have believe Snow was at fault. Some readers on this thread have apparently come away with the impression that it was him who called 911!

Psychosis: not important for us to know about. Later unrelated racist text message between friends: very important for us to know about. You don't feel manipulated?

no... Solint is using Snow as a narrative for representing the attitudes the gentrification brought into Alex's neighborhood. The attitudes that lead to Alex's death.

SoInit is not presenting all the facts because that is not a journalist's job. She has only a limited amount of space (yes even on the web) to work with.

But why are you talking about the messenger rather than the message?

Because it hits too close to home.

It hits 2,257 miles away from my home in Chicago.

What? Presenting all the facts is exactly a journalist's job. If a journalist is presenting a "narrative" instead of the facts, that journalist needs to quit their job and become a novelist.

Is there evidence that Nieto was behaving in a threatening manner, beyond that of having been attacked by a dog? Is there evidence that the responding officers knew of Nieto's diagnosis?

The message does indicate the state of mind of the responding officers.

Yes, there is, in the DA report. It's obviously all up for debate.

No, I don't. I also do not think Snow was complicit or otherwise responsible for Nieto's death, but help contribute to the environment where it was made possible.

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