Brian Williams has been accused of many things, but being racist has not been one of them. Yet one of the stories Williams told whose authenticity has been called into question bears the hallmarks of subtle bigotry.
That story — told over the years to various reporters, writers and others — concerns the time Williams spent at the Ritz-Carlton in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, where he claims groups of dangerous men roamed the hallways with criminal intent.
“Our hotel was overrun with gangs,” Williams told former “NBC Nightly News” managing editor Tom Brokaw in a video published by Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism in June 2014. “You’d hear young, kind-of-thuggish kids walking about and down the hall all night,” he told author Judith Sylvester for her 2008 book The Media and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, according to The Washington Post.
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The outcry from watchdog groups, race scholars, bloggers and others is growing steadily louder when prominent voices drop the word “thug” in conversation. Yet until members of the media stop using it to demonize young black men — or, as appears to be the case with Williams, imaginary young black men — the double standard will continue.
