Media coverage of Indigenous woman’s death biased, insensitive
The case of the unlawful death of Barbara Kentner is rightfully getting the attention it deserves. But in reading the media reports and defence arguments, we have to wonder: What role does the media play in reporting on this high-emotion case factually? What is the impact of implicit bias through the media?
And, perhaps unexpectedly, we ask: What’s in a diagnosis?
There has been an arguably inappropriate focus on Barbara Kentner’s diagnosis of liver disease in the media and the case’s defense. The Chronicle Journal (in Thunder Bay) featured testimony from the forensic pathologist as the first sentence in an article, “Barbara Kentner was a sick woman who would have died of liver disease, but would not have died exactly at the time she did had she not been injured …”
Socially, we often pass unwarranted judgment on the basis of a person’s health conditions whether it be the injection drug user, the homeless, or overweight individuals living with type two diabetes.
We ask you to consider that a diagnosis does not reflect the value of a person’s life, and that Barbara Kentner’s liver disease does not minimize the brutality and unjustness of her death.
We ask you to consider that the emphasis on her illness on the part of the media and defense should not be, and cannot be, used as an excuse or justification for the accused’s actions. The focus of the defense, forensic pathologist, and media surrounding this case on Barbara’s pre-existing liver condition undermines and distracts from the racially-motivated action on trial. It uses a pre-existing medical diagnosis as a scapegoat to shift blame away from the accused.
The Truth and Reconciliation’s Calls to Action ask for the federal government to “publish data on the criminal victimization of Aboriginal people, including data related to homicide” (#39) and “to investigate
the disproportionate victimization of Aboriginal women and girls” (#41).
In order to have accurate reporting on this case, there must be recognition of how the statements reported by a source or said in court by non-Indigenous individuals display implicit bias, perpetuate stereotypes, and unfairly characterize those involved in this case.
We encourage all news sources reporting on this case — and all cases relating to missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls — to be socially accountable. Report through an anti-racist lens about what is being brought before the judge in this trial and what media chooses to focus on thereafter.
We must continually advocate for socially accountable, unbiased, racially-sensitive coverage from the media when paraphrasing accounts from
officials involved in this high-profile and (rightly so) high-emotion case.
The inability to report and discuss a case such as Kentner’s with perspective and compassion perpetuates the rightly-called genocide facing Indigenous women, girls, and two-spirit individuals in this nation, and in this city (Thunder Bay).
Nusha Ramsoondar
Jamie Thompson
Katie Zugic
Northern Ontario School of Medicine students
Concerned citizens
Classy TV hosts Trebek and Philbin leave the stage
In December 1999, Alex Trebek hosted a week of the greatest game show hosts for A&E TV Network’s “Biography.”
Included in that week was Regis Philbin who passed away earlier this year.
It’s sad that we’ve lost these two classy gents and absolute TV professionals. Yet, it’s somehow fitting and appropriate they went in the same year peacefully, with dignity and, thank gawd, free of COVID-19, to game show Heaven where they’ll be hosting from now till eternity.
My sympathies to the City of Greater Sudbury on the loss of their proudly Canadian son, Alex Trebek.
Rory J. Koopmans
Edmonton
