You are here : World News – Russian opinion» AMERICA» NPR will get an earful after claiming Declaration of Independence is riddled with ‘flaws’ and ‘hypocrisies’
NPR will get an earful after claiming Declaration of Independence is riddled with ‘flaws’ and ‘hypocrisies’
NPR has stirred up debate concerning the ‘flawed’ origins of the US after the information outlet marked the July 4th vacation by tweeting out the Declaration of Independence – with some provocative footnotes.
It has change into an annual custom for the group to mark Independence Day with a studying of the historic doc, however this 12 months’s rendition got here with a disclaimer.
“[A]fter final summer time’s protests and our nationwide looking on race, the phrases within the doc land otherwise… It famously declares ‘that every one males are created equal’ despite the fact that girls, enslaved individuals and indigenous Individuals weren’t held as equal on the time,” the outlet, which receives public funding, defined.
This wasn’t NPR’s solely grievance with the 245-year-old declaration. A reference to “Scotch & overseas mercenaries” was later edited out of the textual content, however “a racist slur about Native Individuals” (a line denouncing inside strife provoked by “cruel Indian Savages”) survived the revisions. The doc was additionally stripped of criticism of the slave commerce in a bid to win assist from southern colonists, NPR reported.
Additionally on rt.com
‘Black individuals nonetheless aren’t free’: Congressional ‘Squad’ member Cori Bush says July four is about freedom ‘for white individuals’
On Twitter, NPR took a equally vital method in direction of the world-changing decree. The outlet prefaced a thread containing the total textual content of the doc with the remark that it accommodates “flaws and deeply ingrained hypocrisies.”
On this thread of the Declaration of Independence, you’ll be able to see a doc with flaws and deeply ingrained hypocrisies.
It additionally laid the muse for this nation’s collective aspirations — the hopes for what America might be. pic.twitter.com/znLSGKWLaj
— NPR (@NPR) July four, 2021
The commentary didn’t sit effectively with many on social media.
A number of individuals known as for NPR to be “defunded,” whereas others mentioned that that they had stopped donating to the group resulting from its racial-tinged reporting.
Others argued that NPR was being unfair, noting that any political doc written greater than two centuries in the past will probably be thought of flawed by fashionable requirements.
No doc written 250 years in the past goes to face up to the requirements of as we speak. That’s the reason the Declaration of Independence is a format of Independence and never a Structure. The Declaration of Independence will not be legislation and it isn’t the premise by which SCOTUS interprets the legislation.
— The Centryst (@TheCentryst) July 5, 2021
For some, NPR apparently didn’t go far sufficient. A very zealous opponent of the textual content mentioned that the Declaration of Independence was “signed by WHITE MEN IN WIGS and it’s a lie!”
There have been additionally extra nuanced takes, nevertheless. The doc could have been flawed nevertheless it nonetheless “established the very best hope for all of us,” one remark learn.
Not everybody can maintain two contradictory concepts on the identical time — each it’s a flawed doc, written by slave proprietor proclaiming all males are created equal — and it established the very best hope for all of us, that at some point we might reside as much as the concept everyone seems to be created equal.
— Carl Testerman (@Carl59194973) July 5, 2021
NPR wasn’t alone in sharing a provocative interpretation of Independence Day. US Consultant Cori Bush made headlines after suggesting that the vacation is about freedom for white individuals, however signifies “stolen land” and oppression for blacks.
