Pulitzer Prize-winning “1619 Project” author Nikole Hannah-Jones has recently decided that — contrary to what she’s said on-record a bunch of times — she never meant for her magnum opus to discuss “the true founding” of America.
The 1619 Project "does not argue that 1776 was not the founding of the country, but what it does argue for is that we have largely treated slavery as an asterisk to the American story,” creator @nhannahjones says as President Trump has railed against it. https://t.co/2qsfDPKiV2 pic.twitter.com/2AR3Xqlvj0
— CNN (@CNN) September 18, 2020
Hannah-Jones has been on this all weekend:
This is the last thing I will say about this. The wording in question never appeared in the 1619 Project text. It appears nowhere in the printed copy, something easily verifiable as pointed out to you. It didn't appear in my essay nor any of the actual journalism we produced. https://t.co/O3GmV8cc9W
— Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) September 21, 2020
Apparently, this needs to be said: My Twitter timeline is not official 1619 Project copy. The #1619project is written by an awe-inspiring group of journalists, historians and poets. Those interested in what it actually says can read original text in full: https://t.co/3MtzpJzGZe
— Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) September 21, 2020
I am tortured by the extent to which I have invited this sustained effort to discredit the #1619project, but I also know that a year in, what this effort is truly about it.
— Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) September 21, 2020
I've spent much of the weekend reminding myself that Twitter can be useful and sometimes amazing, but it is not real life, and in many ways, it's simply toxic. So, I am going to be spending a lot less time on here and much more in real life, including working on the 1619 BOOK.
— Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) September 21, 2020
When I first pitched this project, my editor asked me what was my ultimate goal. I told her I wanted Americans to know the date 1619, to force that foundational date into the national lexicon. The extent to which the project continues to be attacked shows the success of the goal.
— Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) September 21, 2020
Every time someone writes or tweets or speaks about 1619, in praise or derision, they are marking the beginning of American slavery, they are acknowledging that date. And that is enough. Be well, all.
— Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) September 21, 2020
Clearly Nikole Hannah-Jones is not well if she actually believes that she didn’t say the things she said.
https://t.co/sM8sFwoU3U pic.twitter.com/AM8X6qt6DK
— JERRY DUNLEAVY (@JerryDunleavy) September 21, 2020
What’s extra-fun about this is that the New York Times is aiding and abetting Hannah-Jones here:
"The goal of The 1619 Project, a major initiative from The New York Times that this issue of the magazine inaugurates, is to reframe American history by considering what it would mean to regard 1619 as our nation’s birth year." – text of 1619 Projecthttps://t.co/fDycXsRp5N pic.twitter.com/aJVC1Ow0DL
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) September 21, 2020
"[T]he year 1619 is as important to the American story as 1776. That black Americans, as much as those men cast in alabaster in the nation’s capital, are this nation’s true ‘‘founding fathers.’" – text of 1619 Project pic.twitter.com/63ZUDCwUov
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) September 21, 2020
She has lied about everything regarding this. A credible newspaper concerned about reputation would retract it. Offer a note, and never publish her again. But The NY Times isn’t about being a newspaper. https://t.co/Sz12CGNrHQ
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) September 21, 2020
couple more years of this and the New York Times will be denying the 1619 Project ever existed.
— tsar becket adams (@BecketAdams) September 21, 2020
Ha! Count on it.
And you know who’s gonna go along with that without pause?
Mr. Reliable Sources himself, CNN’s own Brian Stelter. Not only is Stelter willing to pretend that Hannah-Jones and the New York Times aren’t engaged in some brazen gaslighting attempts, but he’s actively defending Hannah-Jones’ honor from Donald Trump:
Hannah-Jones can’t even get her storyline straight, but no fear. Stelter is here. pic.twitter.com/S1Z7fQt1PC
— Cameron Cawthorne (@Cam_Cawthorne) September 21, 2020
“An attack against journalism”? How does that work, exactly, when Hannah-Jones is now trying to pretend that we all hallucinated what was explicitly stated by both her and the New York Times?
Lmaoooo
— PunkIsDead (@punkisdead7) September 21, 2020
Projection anyone?
— Hard to get up. Defund heels. Need a martini:Nancy (@Pat11909984) September 21, 2020
How does Brian Stelter look at himself with a straight face?
She's not going anywhere and she's completely in touch with reality, which is why she mass-deleted her tweets https://t.co/TY43iYPmNN
— I did not and will not vote for him. Calm down. (@jtLOL) September 21, 2020
Seriously. Brian’s hitching his wagon to the wrongest possible horse.
Which is actually his M.O., so.
The fact that Stelter thinks a) the 1619 Project is journalism and that b) any attack on it is an attack on reality, is far more scary than anyone will admit. Both of those are so wrong that it takes being a genuine idiot or being sinister to say that.
— Phil (@philllosoraptor) September 21, 2020
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