A lot of people wonder why we in civil rights get attention. Now we can produce our following and our members, tens of thousands of people at marches, all kind of stuff and we project an issue that helps people and they say we get too much media coverage. This guy in Florida is doing nothing but hatemongering, has fifty members on a good Sunday and the whole world is standing still. And y’all wonder why I say the media is imbalanced and unfair.
Turning to Smokey Fontaine of the black website NewsOne.com, Sharpton complained that even Barack Obama was forced to address Jones at his press conference:
But as everyone knows he has had to deal with this question of the Islamic Center that is being proposed in lower Manhattan and the threat by this Minister in Florida who I think has gotten unparalleled media attention globally. I mean now, I lead a national organization, have a national syndicated show, TV and radio and they ask why do I get press attention? This man has fifty followers and only because he’s going to burn some Bibles -- I mean some Korans, which is the Bible in Islam -- on hate, he gets world attention and the media doesn’t see a contradiction there.
Many Americans would agree that Rev. Terry Jones didn't deserve national attention for his stunt -- and many of the same Americans would wish the same obscurity on the antics of the Rev. Al Sharpton.
