Why include the race of an anonymous good samaritan couple?
Thank you for thinking critically. I assumed readers would understand the reasoning in this article, but a few people didn't, so it is obviously a fair question.
To begin, let me explain that I frequently cover race and minority communities. I am well aware of the troubled and racist history of using race as an identifying modifier in news stories.
In this case, I thought long and hard. I mean that.
Because the story was intended to help identify the good samaritans -- if they want to come forward -- I included the detail of the couple's race because it will help friends, family or acquaintances recognize them. There are many elderly couples in Pittsburgh, but only about a quarter of them are black or African American. Including the descriptor greatly increases the chances of someone recognizing and identifying the people who helped save this man's life.
The race of the store clerk was not mentioned only because the relatives of the man who had a heart attack did not remember it. If they remembered that the clerk was latino, asian, white, black, whatever, I would have mentioned it. The race of everyone else in the story was not mentioned because it would have been irrelevant.
To begin, let me explain that I frequently cover race and minority communities. I am well aware of the troubled and racist history of using race as an identifying modifier in news stories.
In this case, I thought long and hard. I mean that.
Because the story was intended to help identify the good samaritans -- if they want to come forward -- I included the detail of the couple's race because it will help friends, family or acquaintances recognize them. There are many elderly couples in Pittsburgh, but only about a quarter of them are black or African American. Including the descriptor greatly increases the chances of someone recognizing and identifying the people who helped save this man's life.
The race of the store clerk was not mentioned only because the relatives of the man who had a heart attack did not remember it. If they remembered that the clerk was latino, asian, white, black, whatever, I would have mentioned it. The race of everyone else in the story was not mentioned because it would have been irrelevant.