As of late, CNN has slowly started to lose credibility amongst some multicultural viewers for its clumsy, insensitive, and/or biased reporting and discussions when addressing national issues that affects African-Americans. This time around, they’ve gotten under the skin of Kenyans and Kenyan-American across the world (don’t worry, it has nothing to do with Don Lemon).
The latest hashtag #SomeoneTellCNN rose in response to a report about the terror group and Al-Qaida affiliate, Al-Shabaab, in regards to President Obama’s visit to the African country and his father’s homeland for the Global Entrepreneurship Summit. The network carelessly labeled the country as a “hotbed of terror” both in the report and on television, which outraged many Kenyans across the world. Former CIA officer Rober Baer appeared on the network and boldly claimed that Kenya “is one of the most dangerous trips that the president has ever made…more so than Iraq and Afghanistan.” Many of the citizens strongly believe that the network sensationalized Kenya’s security issues and painted the country in a very negative light.
My response to the amateur CNN interview that they tried to pass as informed discussion #SomeoneTellCNN pic.twitter.com/jqobi2gs98
— chris foot (@ckfoot) July 23, 2015
The hashtag, #SomeoneTellCNN provides true insight on Kenya, learning that Kenya is the second highest destination for tourism in Africa, a place where three former U.S. ambassadors chose to retire, the location for many U.S. and International companies for their African headquarters, and the damning fact that Kenya’s murder and homicide rate is extremely low compared to the United States.
CNN has since edited the headline to indicated that the threat from Al-Shabaab is a specifically a regional one, stating, “President Barack Obama is not just heading to his father’s homeland, but to a region that’s a hotbed of terror.”
Check out video coverage of the blowback here, then flip through some of the most poignant responses in the thread.
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Image Credit: YouTube -
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