Drudge’s Race-Baiting Is Only Getting Worse

A new study from The New Republic determined that the Drudge Report’s use of race-baiting headlines has soared in the last five years, a fact that lends context to the recent flood of conservative media amplifying random, interracial crimes and baselessly assigning them a racial motive.

Matt Drudge’s conservative website Drudge Report is infamous for its obsessive coverage of alleged black-on-white crime and race-baiting headlines. But it’s only getting worse, according to a new analysis by The New Republic. The magazine analyzed Drudge’s use of race-related terms in headlines after 2008 — the year President Obama established himself as a national figure with his first presidential campaign — with Drudge headlines before 2008, and the results are striking. According to the analysis, since 2008, Drudge headlines:

-Referencing “racism” have more than tripled

– With the term “racist” have nearly doubled

– Containing “black” and “crime” have quadrupled, and

– Have included the n-word eight times, a slur not found in Drudge headlines before 2008.

Notably, the analysis highlighted that Drudge often altered headlines to inject a racial component when the original source contained none. This method of race-baiting has spilled over into the broader media. Recently, conservative outlets have seized upon local crime stories and baselessly assigned them racial motives when no such evidence existed. This spate of reckless race-baiting has been repeatedly accompanied by inapt comparisons to the killing of Trayvon Martin, an attempt to highlight a supposed double standard among civil rights leaders and media figures.

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