Corporate Media

Corporate Media Knives Sharpen as Teachers Fight to Stay Alive

By Jim Vail

Sun-Times reporter Nader Issa is a friend of CPS, not teachers.

The news we consume everyday is owned by the ruling class - from newspapers like the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun-Times, as well as the main television and radio stations.

And they are sharpening their knives against the Chicago Teachers Union to denounce the teachers action to take a vote to not return to school buildings during a raging pandemic killing many people.

CTU President Jesse Sharkey just posted on Twitter - "CPS is backing off the date of K-8 start. But this is not 'agreed.' We asked for a delay and demanded they stop discipline against locked-out pre-k/cluster. They can claim to be backing off, trying to buy more time, or whatever, but don't lie that this was an agreement."

This tweet was made in response to the Sun-Times reporter Nader Issa tweeting - "Breaking: CPS officials say they 'have agreed to a request from CTU leadership to push back the return of K-8 teachers and staff to Wednesday, Jan. 27 ... to ensure we have the time needed to resolve our discussions without risking disruption to student learning."

This Sun-Times reporter did not do what you are supposed to do if you are a reporter - get both sides to the story. He never called the CTU to confirm this so-called agreement. Instead, Nader just presented one side of the story, CPS, and did not bother to get the union's opinion. How's that for reporting both sides to a story so we can understand the problem.

But that is exactly what he is paid to do, report the news on behalf of the ruling class who own this paper. Not the union or people's perspective.

Issa, with his 12,000 followers on Twitter, went one step further to show he is not a 'journalist' but rather a paid PR hack on behalf of the city officials who represent big business.

He also tweeted out the CTU bulletin - "Breaking: CTU members vote to defy CPS reopening plans and continue working from home tomorrow because of health and safety concerns, a source says. About 86% of CTU members voted, and 71% of those members approved the collective action."

Issas then tweeted next - "To put this another way, 61% of the CTU's full membership voted to approve this resolution. The union set a 60% threshold for this vote, so this just eked - an unusually close vote for CTU labor actions."

So was this really the Sun-Times reporter's thoughts, because they just happen to perfectly coincide with the bosses of this city which is to avert a strike and make us all return to the school buildings, despite few safety precautions taken, like regular testing and clean schools.

How bad is the Sun-Times, despite being owned by the Chicago Federation of Laborers among other investors?

Members First Facebook page posted the Sun-Times editorial that demands the teachers return to the schools. They argued in the editorial that children falling behind academically due to the remote learning is more important than the lives of children and teachers who at are risk in buildings burning with the virus.

Both papers and the big four TV stations report the news in a way that appears 'objective' but in reality it is slanted and biased toward their owners. Right now the union on behalf of its members and the communities in Chicago, is in a fight to demand safe schools and teachers and students be vaccinated until we return so we are not risking our lives.

The corporate media we read does not agree with you the workers, they agree with the bosses who run CPS and tell the mayor what to do.