On the 20th anniversary of the Million Man March, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan organized another rally. The theme was “Justice or Else”. The event was widely attended by people all over the country, the world, even celebrities were on the scene.

However, who was grossly missing from the coverage? The national media was largely blind to the peaceful events in Washington, DC.

No Don Lemon from CNN and his exaggerations, lies and misquotes on the activities on the ground. No Fox News wall to wall coverage of the largely peace scene of black people milling about, uniting and wanting to move forward together.

From CNN: Farrakhan, 82, spoke to the crowd on the National Mall in Washington and reflected on the importance of passing the torch to the next generation.

“We who are getting older… what good are we if we don’t prepare young people to carry that torch of liberation to the next step? What good are we if we think we can last forever and not prepare others to walk in our footsteps?” he said.

The overall message seemed to be directed at the black community at large, not just men. Many women and children were in the crowd and Farrakhan talked at length about how men should honor women.

Another difference: This rally was clearly aimed at the digital generation. A website,www.justiceorelse.com, carried a live webcast of the events and made it easy for people to donate money or volunteer. Speakers encouraged the crowd to share images and video of the rally on social media, and #MillionManMarch became a trending topic for much of the day.

What news outlets covered the “Justice or Else” Million Man March anniversary?

There were a few news outlets that covered the rally, however, there were not many. These three outlets were on the scene and constantly reporting the widely positive, peaceful rally of black people from around the country and world standing in unity, togetherness for our common futures.

Those outlets were C-Span, PBS, and Al Jazeera. Man props and shout outs to these organizations. They are obviously not in the typical mass media business of promoting negative images of black people around the world and are willing to show some balance in our global image.

Although it is wonderful these outlets are willing to be unbiased in their coverage, nothing would be better than us supporting our own media outlets so we don’t have to beg, hope or pray someone else will display positive, uplifting images of the black community.

As Urban Intellectuals grows, we hope to one day fill those shoes in the media space for the black community. However, until then, please make a conscious effort to watch, support and invest in black media outlets.

We must control our own images and stop depending, thinking others will do it for us.

We all we got!

Source: CNN