An article from the Memphis Commercial Appeal, part of the USA Today network caught my eye. Not because I read the Memphis Commercial Appeal. Heaven forfend! I know that Elvis fans love Memphis. It’s too delta for me; in other words, the humidity is brutal. No, the Knoxville News Sentinel, my hometown paper reprinted this article.

The article is by a “journalist” named Tonyaa Weathersbee. The article in question is titled “Confederate statue must go: Forrest represented slavery and murder, Health Sciences Park doesn’t”. Now, I read this article and then checked at the top for “Opinion” or “Editorial”. Nope. This was allegedly straight forward news reporting.

Now, when those who consider themselves elites and opinion makers say that there is no bias in news reporting, this is what causes me massive agita. Many of these elites won’t even acknowledge “advocacy journalism”. Although, I would argue that Miss Weathersbee passed go on advocacy and went straight to emotional manipulation.

Check out this form emotional manipulation, from the article:

For Cheryl Bird and Bryan Goodman, removing Nathan Bedford Forrest’s statue from Health Sciences Park is a matter of conscience.

Conscience because as dentistry students at the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, they not only help people heal, they make a pledge to do no harm.

Yet the statue of the Confederate general that casts its oppressive shadow over a park — one that a fraction of their tuition is used to spruce up — represents the opposite.

“Conscience”, “heal” and “do no harm” all bring good thoughts to the brain. “Oppressive” and “shadow” are scary words. But, Miss Weathersbee has more emotional tricks up her sleeve. Again, from the article:

Forrest hurt black people — people who make up 65 percent of this city. He sold and owned slaves. He led a massacre of black Union soldiers at Fort Pillow as they surrendered, a massacre so savage that their blood dyed the Mississippi River red.

And he was once the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, a white supremacist organization that terrorizes African-Americans to this day.

In other words, Forrest did a lot a harm.

“Forrest hurt black people” is kind of “duh”. Slavery itself hurt black people. Slavery was a very bad thing. Now, I don’t really care about the statue of Nathan Bedford Forrest. Other than it is a beautifully made statue, as most of statues used to be. If it would make the UT Memphis, Health Science students happy it could be replaced with something like the statue below. It’s Japanese, but it makes me think of the uninspired, cold and flat ugly Soviet style architecture. It’s ugly, but it won’t offend. Well, it offends me, but they are apparently not bright enough to be offended. Don’t get your knickers in a bunch, kiddies. I am sure you had epic MCATs and you are wizard at parroting back what you are spoon fed.

If you took the nameplates off of the statue of the reprehensible Forrest, could these children not look at the sculpture as a beautifully muscled horse ridden by a proud man with great posture? Nah, these little cherubs are on a mission to purge us of our fourth great grandparents sins. And, they are pushed forward by Miss Weathersbee, who is not only a journalist, but teaches it too. Squee!

The problem is none of us is perfect. We are all flawed, even the self-righteous Health Sciences students at the University of Tennessee-Memphis.

Today, we revere the Buffalo Soldiers and we build monuments to these warriors. The Indians or Aboriginal Americans whose tribes were hassled and massacred might say that the Buffalo Soldiers “hurt” them to use Miss Weathersbee’s word. Personally, I love the Buffalo Soldier monument at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas as a tribute to the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry (the Buffalo Soldiers) and as a work of art.

Miss Weathersbee with her emotional manipulation, The Commercial Appeal, the Knoxville News Sentinel and USA Today may all want to rethink their “journalism”. Revolutions tend to eat their own children.