Cornel West, Marc Lamont Rip Fox for Anti-#BlackLivesMatter ‘Hate Group’ Narrative

Fox News has recently stepped up its outrage against #BlackLivesMatter following more officer deaths. Elisabeth Hasslebeck asked on the air why the movement isn’t being called a hate group yet, and that opened the floodgates of Fox Newsers really going after the movement, citing provocative rhetoric like “Pigs in a blanket, fry ’em like bacon!” On CNN’s Reliable Sources this morning, Cornel West and Marc Lamont Hill pushed back against that narrative.

West admitted there’s been some “hyperbolic rhetoric,” but said that happens whenever there is “black rage expressed based on black suffering,” and insisted there is no concrete evidence connecting #BlackLivesMatter to police deaths.

Hill, meanwhile, said that Fox News is being hypocritical for saying a few “outliers” represent the whole movement, but saying that wasn’t true of the tea party. (Incidentally, Fox’s Megyn Kelly made the same hypocrisy argument the other way round a few days ago.)

Hill said that it’s important to talk about the horrible deaths of police officers, but said when this “hate group” rhetoric gets ramped up, people in the movement are put in a defensive position and not able to address their issues.

And “particular media outlets,’ he continued (which includes Fox), are in this game to “troll the world” to say the suffering #BlackLivesMatter protesters are speaking out about is unimportant.

Watch the video below, via CNN:

[image via screengrab]

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Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac

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