Critiquing a Critic
School shootings are indeed a tragedy that rock our nation each time it happens. What makes it more so is the never-ending news cycle that seeks to politicize events while they are happening. The Parkland shooting was no exception. However, this time the underage student survivors took up political arms with pundits mixed into the fray. In an op-ed article, Molly Roberts wrote an opinion article entitled “Can we criticize the Parkland kids?” (Roberts). This was written as a response to an editorial published by Charles C.W. Cooke entitled “David Hogg is Fair Game for Critics” in the National Review (Cooke).
Molly Roberts is the editor, writer and producer for the opinion section of the left leaning Washington Post. Roberts …show more content…
She goes on to affirm Cooke in his view that liberals can’t have it both ways. Liberals can’t view the Parkland children as “adult enough to helm a mass movement, but insist they are too childlike for critics to come after them” (Cooke). She ends the paragraph by stating, likewise, conservatives can’t call the students of Parkland innocent children who shouldn’t participate, and say they are conniving leftists gaining fame or political gain on the death of their friends (Roberts). However, nowhere in his article for the National Review does Cooke say that Hogg is a leftist gaining fame, or that he shouldn’t participate. Quite the contrary. Cooke states in his article that Hogg should be given a platform to speak as often as he likes. Any mention of leftist gain is squarely placed on adult journalists that sit silently through Hogg’s many television segments that are wrought with his errors. Cooke clearly states the adults in these situations are playing both sides for a political agenda and says that their actions are condescending to Hogg. Cooke points out that “those contending with Hogg’s pronouncements are accepting that he has an opinion, and that it is worth countering — that is, they are doing exactly what Hogg’s boosters have asked: treating him as the leader of a …show more content…
She states that bashing Hogg isn’t constructive and is callous because he’s a child that just watched his friends die. Here Roberts inserts history of a far right-wing conspiracy that labeled David Hogg as a crisis actor and insinuates that Cooke has called Hogg a liar and an idiot who shouldn’t be on T.V. Roberts furthers this line of thinking by agreeing with Cooke that it’s wrong to protect Hogg from arguments on merit, but continues to say that “shielding a child from spite and slander is another matter” (Roberts). However, the truth is far less innocuous. Cooke’s opening line in his article emphatically states “David Hogg, the telegenic 17-year-old who survived the shooting in Parkland, is not a crisis actor, an FBI plant, or the secret brainchild of a Soros-backed CNN plot. He’s a political advocate engaged in a political debate, and he should be treated as such” and goes on to say, “David Hogg is an American, and he should speak as often and as loudly as he wishes” (Cooke). There will always be conspiracy theorists and sensationalists on the internet. You don’t have to look any farther than YouTube or Facebook to find them. However, it is unreasonable to compare professional journalists of the caliber of Charles C. W. Cooke with Alex Jones. Cooke is the editor