Including the Sunday, September 7, 2014 front-page story, the Star Tribune has run more front page Sunday “terror” articles on local Somalis going to the Middle East to fight than the actual number of young men and women who have gone to fight.
How is this even a story? Not one individual that has left Minnesota has been proven to have killed anyone. What is the Star Tribune’s obsession with this all about? It is such an empty, toothless nonstory.
Do they not have some real serious crimes that they can put on the front page of the Sunday paper? They continue to practice sensationalism at the expense of the Somali community. The Strib continues to darken the cloud over our wonderful Somali community in a way that makes local Somalis feel their entire community is being put on trial.
Yet when Whites commit crimes, the whole White community is not put on the hot seat. This is not a Somali community problem. A community is not responsible for the actions of certain individuals within that community. Individuals are responsible for their own behavior. To blame anyone else in this type of situation is racist.
And there is a reason why they keep putting these “terror” stories on the front page of their Sunday editions: Their Sunday edition has twice the circulation as their weekly editions. They’re trying to get as much mileage out of the Somali community as possible.
Words are easy and free. Anyone can define themselves as good and their enemy as evil using words, but actions are a bit more of a challenge.
The actions of the U.S. government have killed tens of thousands of people in the past 12 years, and those who have left Minnesota to fight in support of iihad are known to have killed none.
Frank Erickson lives in Minneapolis.
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