photo-1452915858640-325b467fe554Catching up on the random streams from my content apps, I watched a story get spun in a series of swipes. First, I had not heard about the Seahawks and their ‘demonstration of unity’. That isn’t surprising. I hate the Seahawks. I know hate is a strong word. But I’m a Packer fan and other Packer fans will understand. The freedom to strongly dislike a sports rival is something to be cherished and enjoyed by fans. The freedom to protest is also pretty clear–whether you like the actions or not. But to be honest, there is a form of hate-journalism going on with the NFL, its players, and social commentary. Obviously, public opinion is not journalism, and we all have the right to our opinion. We also have a right to understand the real story, and that is often obscured by the digital blur and a chase for clicks.

From a “Demonstration of Unity” to a “Demonstration” to a “Protest”

The buzz on the Seattle NFL team was that they were going to demonstrate on 9/11. Who wouldn’t be outraged? Especially those of us who lost a friend on that horrible day. David Rivers was considered the ‘coolest guy covering financial technology on Wall Street’. He was on the ground talking technology with the people who were disrupting the financial world before they even realized it. I can only imagine what he’d be saying about the rise of Fintech in the last 15 years.

This week, certain online outlets were making the Seahawks upcoming pre-game ‘surprise’ seem deplorable. Many conveniently left out the ‘unity’ part of the ‘demonstration of unity’ statement. It wasn’t hard to connect demonstration to 911 and get a lot of people riled up. Other stories from all political angles started to label it a ‘protest’.  Protesters like to promote the next protest. Anti-protesters like to protest against what’s being protested. The team took a vow of silence.

Stories will always be spun. We need people on the ground to unravel them.

I didn’t want to read what political hacks said about it. I wanted someone on the ground, someone who might actually be in touch with the people at the center of the story. I wanted a writer like David Rivers to be the expert and sort things out. For the Seahawks story, that could only be the local reporter for the Seattle Times. Makes sense, right? The local guy had the most objective point of view and quoted anyone who would talk toreinforce that the ‘demonstration of unity’ would be a powerful tribute by the team. Stories will always be spun. We need people on the ground to unravel them.