If things were as bad as Mississippi NAACP President Derrick Johnson and Stacey Payton claimed on Monday during the presser on what was claimed to be a racially motivated “noose” incident at Stone High School then there would have been no need for either he or the child’s parents to embellish their accounts with several white lies. Let’s recap:
1. The claim that local law enforcement tried sweeping the incident under the rug has been flatly contradicted by the Sheriff Department Captain assigned to the case.
2. The claim that the school district had done nothing about the incident was not only contradicted by the fact the Head Football Coach immediately kicked the alleged perpetrator off the team but also belatedly by Stone County School Board Attorney Sean Courtney, who revealed today the perpetrator had been suspended by the School District with the disciplinary due process started. Only one child was involved in a non-racially motivated incident instead of the four Johnson and Payton wanted to see charged with federal hate crimes.
3. Finally there seems to be some confusion between a jump rope tied into a lasso and a hangman’s noose, the key here I think is that one term while sensational does not convey the reality of what happened outside the football locker room. Ms. Payton, being a language arts instructor at Gulf Coast, would be well aware that IMHO.
Of course Superintendent of Education Penny Owen going into hiding on Monday gets a contributory attaboy because by hiding instead of engaging the media, the School District insured it would lose whatever control they could have exerted over the resulting coverage by balancing out some of the whoppers Johnson told at the presser Monday. Instead the town made the National news and not in a good way.
Even worse it appears all this was precipitated by High School kids making political statements flying a symbol of hate in the Confederate Battle flag from their pickup trucks on school grounds. That should have been nipped in the bud because this is where some of the hard feelings are coming from, rightfully so I’ll add. Continue reading “NAACP Stone High Noose allegations unraveling like cheap sweater after entire town branded as racists by the media”