Issac Bailey, a 2014 Nieman Fellow, is a journalist, race relations seminar creator and facilitator, and the author of “Why Didn’t We Riot? A Black Man in Trumpland” (Other Press, October 2020). He is also the author of “My Brother Moochie: Regaining Dignity in the Face of Crime, Poverty, and Racism in the American South” (Other Press, 2018). He has contributed to Politico, CNN.com, Time, and The Washington Post. He is a former columnist and senior writer for The Sun News in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and he was a 2011 recipient of a Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism for stories about a child protection case. The state subsequently revamped the way it handles such cases.
I’ve been torn this month about what to focus on: the refusal of our industry to take true diversity goals seriously or the state of our democracy in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 insurrection. But I’ve come to realize … Read more
Let’s take a brief look at the problem with political reporting. First, I read a story by the Associated Press explaining why the Democratic brand is “toxic” in many largely white rural areas in the United States. It included … Read more
It didn’t take the Swiss leaving behind their well-known and well-worn status of neutrality to know the events unfolding in Ukraine are potentially world-changing and deserve the wall-to-wall, front-page coverage they are receiving. There are plenty of reasons for … Read more
I am happy to report that my chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP), an extremely rare autoimmune disease that attacks my nerve linings and for a time put me in a wheelchair and what we thought could be my death bed, … Read more
I knew I had arrived as an important member of my family when I was allowed to lift the 50-pound bag of rice at the grocery store and take it into the house once we got home. It meant I … Read more
Something astounding happened in 2020: Major crime — which includes armed assault, robbery, car jackings, rape, and murder — dropped by 5 about percent from 2019. Conventional wisdom has it that crime is likely to increase during periods of upheaval. Read more
I can’t think about the horrific images of people in Afghanistan clinging to the wheels of U.S. military airplanes without thinking of the coverage of the Iraq war on April 9, 2003. It was the day an iconic statue … Read more
Seems we need a reminder. On Jan. 6, 2021, the nation’s Capitol building was attacked — not figuratively, but literally. Thousands of people descended upon D.C. in an attempt to stop the certification of the results from the 2020 presidential … Read more
The New York Times story about internal struggles at the ACLU. is an illustration of the futility of clinging to “objectivity.” It parallels the wrestling over the First Amendment and the ongoing fight for equality inside newsrooms … Read more
I started the video at about 5:01 and just let it play, as part of my Exploring Fake News journalism class at Davidson College this past semester. The video was captured on the bodycam worn by the … Read more
