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Journalism: Major media outlets report on COVID death of a man who 'mocked' vaccinations on Twitter last month

Every one in a while there’s a COVID-19 story that bubbles up into the media, like when Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson revealed they’d tested positive for the coronavirus while working in Australia. That was news because they were celebrities and there was no vaccine yet. NBC News, republishing a story by the Associated Press, is apparently trying to make a celebrity out of a man who “mocked” COVID-19 vaccinations on social media and died at a hospital after contracting the virus.

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They even name and shame him: Stephen Harmon. The Associated Press reports:

Before his hospitalization, Harmon had made fun of vaccination efforts on social media.

“I got 99 problems but a vax ain’t one,” he said in a tweet last month.

On July 8, he posted: “Biden’s door to door vaccine ‘surveyors’ really should be called JaCovid Witnesses. #keepmovingdork.”

What the hell?

What’s worse are the commenters:

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https://twitter.com/sevblack7/status/1419037165447651330

https://twitter.com/DanSigner/status/1419068294737190913

Seriously?

It’s nice to know people really care about the victims of COVID.

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https://twitter.com/ktmacg79/status/1419063891267555329

If the journalisming came from anywhere, it looks like NBC News picked up the story from the Associated Press who picked it up from CBS Los Angeles. It’s not made clear in the original story who thought to go through his social media accounts and make a news story of them.


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