A reporter was fired by her news station after she shared an article about white privilege on her Facebook page.
Lisa Benson Cooper worked at KSHB-TV news station in Kansas City, Mo., where she says she was suspended from her position as a reporter after two of her white co-workers saw an article on her Facebook page titled “How White Women Use Strategic Tears to Silence Women of Color.”
Cooper posted the Guardian article, which was written by author Ruby Hamad, on her page on May 9, 2018. The article describes the experience many women of color share when having an open discussion with white women about racism and discrimination. The article highlights how white women often victimize themselves when confronted with conversations about race. After hearing that Cooper was suspended, Hamad took to Twitter to bring awareness to her situation.
“On May 9th, Lisa shared this piece I wrote for The Guardian, about a common but only recently voiced phenomenon where WoC who raise issues about race & their mistreatment esp. at work are punished by white women who claim the WoC is ‘attacking’ them,” Ruby Hamad tweeted Monday (Aug. 20). “Lisa shared this piece on her PERSONAL Facebook page which is set to private. Two white female colleagues saw her post,” Hamad tweeted. “They contacted HR.” Hamad added that Cooper was suspended for two days because she made “broad, unfair characterizations of white women as a group based on their race and gender.”
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Cooper then took to Facebook on June 13 to announce she was no longer with the station. “I want you to know, I did not quit my job 41 Action News — KSHB-TV,” she wrote. “I was suspended for sharing a meme & a Guardian U.S. article on my personal FB page and subsequently told I ‘shall not report to work’ for the duration of my contract.”
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Now Cooper is taking legal action against KSHB-TV, a Scripps company; the company denies her claims of racial discrimination. Her lawsuit claims “race was constantly used” when they assigning her stories. She also says they would send her to always send her to urban core areas and sent her to interview a Ku Klux Klan member by herself.
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This is the second racial discrimination lawsuit the station has received this year.
