Did you hear the story about the conservative city councilman who was so incensed at private-citizen critics that he or she published their names and addresses and accused them of racism in the process?
Of course you didn't. If it happened, press coverage of "right-wing intimidation" would be everywhere. Instead, "doxing," the term given to such exposures, is a technique predominantly practiced by hardened leftists and even occasionally by their politicians, more often than not with little in the way of media or other repercussions. One such person who appears to be skating virtually scot-free is Minneapolis City Council member Alondra Cano.
Specifically, "doxing" involves "publishing someone’s home address and other personal information on the Internet in order to expose them to harassment." In particularly scorched-earth examples, spouses, children and employers are including in the doxing effort, with the following intended effect:
The fact is that SJWs (misnamed "social justice warriors" — Ed.) are out to disqualify, discredit, and disemploy everyone who does not share their dedication to social justice ideals. Everyone. ... Cross them, even inadvertently, and they will attempt to destroy you, your career, and your family.
Cano was definitely in the doxing spirit when she tweeted the following information, since deleted, about "at least four" of her constituents who were outraged at her participation in the Black Lives Matter disruption at the Mall of America just before Christmas:
The tweet graphic above, obtained from Twitchy — but not posted at the Minneapolis Star Tribine, which appears to have originally broken the story — is particularly revealing, because it shows how thin-skinned and instinctively prone to false attacks Ms. Cano is.
Apparently after some initial blowback, the councilwoman replaced her deleted tweets with the following still-present smear:
Readers will note that there's not even a hint of racism in the constituent's comment — only a criticism of Ms. Cano's failure to follow the law and disobeying a judge's order.
Ms. Cano has skated and likely will continue to skate without even having to answer for her actions. That's because the press is almost completely uninterested in reporting on her intimidation, even though it pertains to a story to which they otherwise devoted a great deal of attention:
- Scott Johnson at Powerline noted that "The Star Tribune doesn’t have a single story following up on its Hot Dish Politics post of December 24. Has the story even appeared in the newspaper?" (I doubt it, John.) He also noted that local public radio and a local TV station covered the story.
- There is no indication of a national or even local story at the Associated Press.
- There is no story at the New York Times.
- A Google News search early Wednesday morning on Ms. Cano's full name (in quotes, past week, sorted by date) returned 18 items, all from either local or center-right news outlets.
This writer can remember a time — and it isn't that long ago — when our local paper would publish the address of Letters to the Editor writers, perhaps to show readers that opinions were coming in from all over the metro area. One of those letter writers happened to be a relative. She was rewarded for expressing her conservative opinion with a 4 a.m. phone call from a person who vocally objected to what she wrote.
Incidents such as that one explain why those quaint days are long gone — largely thanks to the very enablers-by-silence in the media who tend to complain the loudest and longest about our current lack of "civility."
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
