Police Violence and Protests: Digital Media Maintenance of Racism, Protest Repression, and the Status Quo
Abstract
Analyzing news coverage of the killing of Stephon Clark in 2018, this research contributes to the further theorization of the hierarchy of social struggle by (1) confirming the consistent use of demonizing and delegitimizing framing devices to describe Black human rights protest, and (2) illustrating that the quality of the presentation of grievances and demands must also be considered when assessing the degree to which coverage can be legitimizing for a racial justice movement. In addition, findings show selective social media sharing amplified the limited coverage about police character but amplified sensational reports of injury.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Social media counterpublics, such as Black Twitter, have shifted problematic frames of protest coverage by critiquing legacy media publicly.
“Research has shown that social media counterpublics, such as Black Twitter, have shifted problematic frames of protest coverage by critiquing legacy media publicly (Brown 2021).”
From Reporting on Black Lives Matter in 2020: How Digital Black Press Outlets Covered the Racial Uprisings (2025) · cites this paper as Brown 2021
The debate frame is more commonly used by the alternative press and helps to legitimize protests by highlighting the protesters' social critiques.
“However, this frame is more commonly used by the alternative press and helps to legitimize protests by highlighting the protesters' social critiques (Brown 2021;Harlow et al. 2020).”
From Reporting on Black Lives Matter in 2020: How Digital Black Press Outlets Covered the Racial Uprisings (2025) · cites this paper as Brown 2021
Mainstream news coverage of protests typically critiques and demonizes protesters, highlights extremists and violence, and preferences official perspectives.
“Typically, this type of news coverage critiques and demonizes protesters, highlights extremists and violence, and preferences official perspectives (Brown 2021;Di Cicco 2010).”
From Reporting on Black Lives Matter in 2020: How Digital Black Press Outlets Covered the Racial Uprisings (2025) · cites this paper as Brown 2021
Brown (2021) found that some of the most circulated coverage related to Stephon Clark's death was about two African American professional basketball players who helped pay for his funeral.
“Brown (2021) found that some of the most circulated coverage related to Stephon Clark's death was about two African American professional basketball players who helped pay for his funeral.”
From Reporting on Black Lives Matter in 2020: How Digital Black Press Outlets Covered the Racial Uprisings (2025) · cites this paper as Brown 2021
Cites
#Ferguson is everywhere: initiators in emerging counterpublic networks
Jackson, S. J., & Foucault Welles, B. (2016) · Information, Communication & Society · doi:10.1080/1369118x.2015.1106571 · Cited by 276 · see citing works
Harlow, S., Brown, D. K., Salaverría, R., & García-Perdomo, V. (2020) · Journalism Studies · doi:10.1080/1461670x.2020.1776144 · Cited by 80 · see citing works
Self-citation
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Williams Fayne, M., & Richardson, A. V. (2025) · The International Journal of Press/Politics · doi:10.1177/19401612231187562 · Cited by 31 · see citing works
- Authors
- Brown, D. K.
- Affiliations
- University of Minnesota (US)
- Corresponding author
- Brown, Danielle K.
- ORCID
- Brown, Danielle K.
- Venue
- Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2021-01-01
- Volume
- 65
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 157-176
- ISSN
- 0883-8151 (ISSN-L)
- 1550-6878
- OpenAlex
- W3150163661
- Cited by
- 50
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 7 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 21 · 2021: 1
- FWCI
- 11.95
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Communication › Media Studies and Communication
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Policing Practices and Perceptions
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Race, History, and American Society
- Keywords
- police brutality, news framing, demonization, delegitimization, Black protest, racial justice movements, social media sharing, selective exposure, protest repression, police accountability
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
