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The Root accused of racism after piece by New York Times contributor declares ‘Whiteness is a Pandemic’

The digital magazine The Root was accused of racism Wednesday after publishing an article declaring “Whiteness is a Pandemic” in response to Tuesday’s deadly shootings in Georgia.

There was a rush to conclude that the shootings that killed eight people at three Atlanta-area massage parlors were hate crimes after officials confirmed that six of the eight victims were Asian-Americans. Investigators said Wednesday that the suspected gunman, 21-year-old Robert Long, told them he was motivated by a “sexual addiction”. They added that racism “did not appear to be the motive”. Long has since been charged with multiple counts of murder and assault.

In the piece, Root senior editor Damon Young argued that “Whiteness” is a “public health crisis.”

“It shortens life expectancies, it pollutes air, it constricts equilibrium, it devastates forests, it melts ice caps, it sparks (and funds) wars, it flattens dialects, it infests consciousnesses, and it kills people—[W]hite people and people who are not [W]hite, my mom included,” Young began. “There will be people who die, in 2050, because of white supremacy-induced decisions from 1850.”

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SILENCE: Media Outlets Won’t Explain Why Damning Clinton-Epstein Article Was Quietly Deleted

Very shortly after the stories were published, they were quickly deleted from the websites. However, National File was able to retrieve this portion of the Daily Beast article from Google’s cache:

“Bill Clinton’s former body man and aide has cooperated with the federal investigation into the former president’s ties to Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, Radar Online reports. Doug Band, normally reticent to speak about his former boss, spoke with prosecutors for the Southern District of New York around December 2020 about the millionaire sex trafficker and his alleged madam, according to the site. Band made frequent appearances on Epstein’s flight manifests in the early 2000s, at one point traveling with his alleged girlfriend Naomi Campbell to the financier’s private island Little St. James, known locally as “pedophile island.” He also accompanied Epstein and Clinton on lengthy trips through Africa and Asia. Band has claimed he urged the Clintons to cut ties with Epstein and Maxwell for years, but photos as recently as 2007 show him partying with the pair. Virginia Roberts Giuffre, one of Epstein’s many victims, named Band in a 2016 court filing as one of 70 people who would have knowledge of Epstein’s and Maxwell’s alleged sex trafficking.”

Additionally, users on Reddit posted what appears to be the full Radar Online story, as pointed out by the anti-human trafficking Twitter account known as “An Open Secret.” 

The articles were removed in the early afternoon of March 5. Less than an hour after the deletions, National File reached out to Daily Beast and Radar Online for clarification and explanation, but has not received any response. National File specifically asked if the respective outlets intended to notify readers of a retraction.

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