Deborah Lipp

Yesterday’s Chronicle ran a story on an unique immigration protest: five motorcyclists who call themselves the Paul Revere Riders, crossing the country to sound the alarm about illegal immigrants. Here’s a representative sample:

“One if by land, two if by sea, three if from Mexico,” declares their Web site — comparing illegal migrants from Mexico to British redcoats of two centuries ago.

“The idea is to get enough people enough excited about their country to take action,” said leader Frosty Wooldridge when the group arrived in Los Gatos Tuesday evening. “Paul Revere in April of 1775 was the great communicator. He rode and spread the word and actually beat the British. We’re trying to spread the word through our neighbors and through the Internet.

“We’ve seen people march for anarchy, march for Mexico, march for illegality,” said Wooldridge, who hopes legal immigration will be reduced dramatically and illegal entries stopped altogether. “It’s time we as Americans stand up.”

The story quotes exactly five people: the leader, and four of the anti-immigration protestors. All had positive things to say about the ride, and about the anti-immigration cause. Nobody was quoted with anything critical to say. A story on a politically charged protest ends up coming off as a human interest story.

Just to be clear, I don’t think the reporter, Tyche Hendricks, has an agenda here. Hendricks has written similarly uncritical reports on pro-immigration rallies, and has occasionally done excellent reporting on the issue (including a piece about the historical elephant in the room: the Bracero program of the ’40s and ’50s, which amounted to the legalized and systematized exploitation of Mexican ‘guest’ workers for the benefit of agribusiness). Still, to report on such an inflammatory protest without any negative comment is just…odd. Besides, of course, being sloppy reporting.

But it isn’t the sloppiest thing about this story. The human in this human interest story, Frosty Wooldridge, happens to be a fairly prolific writer; there is much more to judge him on than just a softball piece in the Chron.

Like this:

Multi-culturalism scorched the streets of Paris! Multi-culturalism burns and kills in France, Holland, Belgium, Germany and Britain. Recent violence corroborates that disparate cultures cannot exist together….Americans roll over and sleep as the Muslim and Mexican invasion accelerates in the United States.

Or this:

Jay Leno is one of the few left in LA who speaks English. High school race riots in LA are common. Blacks and Mexicans coexist with razor sharp tension. Educational standards degrade into meaninglessness in California schools faster than you can flip a burger. Crime grows by the day as Mexicans imbed further into the systems faster than laws can imprison them.

Or this:

Southern France is now known as Northern Nigeria. Over five million Muslims own Southern France. They are not French, don’t speak French, and don’t respect France as French….[The French] will either lose their country and language, or wall off southern France to the immigrants to save themselves.

Or this:

Have you noticed dozens of languages being spoken by citizens and illegal aliens in America? Do you feel the disrespect and the separation? Do you feel violated? …Do you feel like your country is being stolen from you along with your language?

Or this:

Political correctness is killing America. Our leaders wielding the mighty ax of political correctness will be shown in the history books to have murdered the United States of America. Its blood will drain out of its citizens as an advancing horde of illegal alien migrants kills America’s ability to function….Bob from New Jersey said, “What did generations of my family fight and die for in wars? Get the illegals out, close the borders and move them into internment camps until we get things sorted.”

Wooldridge’s writings are filled with this sort of xenophobic racism. Like the Minutemen, Wooldridge is in the business of mainstreaming hate.

The Chronicle has a history of failing to report on the background or associations of right-wing activists. (Maybe they’re no worse than most papers, and I just notice it because I read the Chronicle more often; I don’t know.) This one is particularly dangerous, though. Just as Wooldridge is mainstreaming hate, the Chronicle, by failing to highlight his ugly side, is helping to mainstream Wooldridge.

[Cross-posted at If I Ran the Zoo]