The Case of the 'Racist' NY Dog Walker Looks Like Covington All Over Again
The court of social media has spoken and it has found Amy Cooper guilty of racism based on one side of a story and very little information.
Cooper, a New York woman, was walking her dog when she and a black man, Christian Cooper, who is not related to her, got into a verbal confrontation.
Christian, who was in the park to watch birds, was upset by the fact that Amy’s dog was off-leash against the rules.
As Christian was arguing with Amy to leash her dog, he offered her dog a treat, which caused the woman to panic, apparently thinking the man might poison her dog.
It was then that Christian started recording the altercation. He then showed it to his sister, who posted it on Twitter, and the social media court was in session.
The Twitter mob branded Amy a “Karen” — internet slang for a malcontent tattletale — but it was really Christian who was the “Karen” in this situation.
It was he and his sister who waged a social media war against the woman and, by virtue of his own Facebook post, we know he was the instigator.
By Christian’s own admission, this is how the conversation happened:
ME: Look, if you’re going to do what you want, I’m going to do what I want, but you’re not going to like it.
HER: What’s that?
ME (to the dog): Come here, puppy!
HER: He won’t come to you.
ME: We’ll see about that…
I pull out the dog treats I carry for just such intransigence. I didn’t even get a chance to toss any treats to the pooch before Karen scrambled to grab the dog.
The major issue for Amy is what happened after that. She phoned the police and in the most melodramatic way possible said that a black man was threatening her life.
“I’m taking a picture and calling the cops,” she said. “I’m going to tell them there’s an African-American man threatening my life.”
Amy’s phone call spurred the internet into action and she was promptly fired by her employer, the investment firm Franklin Templeton.
She was also labeled a racist for having the audacity to call the police.
“Following our internal review of the incident in Central Park yesterday, we have made the decision to terminate the employee involved, effective immediately. We do not tolerate racism of any kind at Franklin Templeton,” the company announced on Twitter.
Following our internal review of the incident in Central Park yesterday, we have made the decision to terminate the employee involved, effective immediately. We do not tolerate racism of any kind at Franklin Templeton.
— Franklin Templeton (@FTI_US) May 26, 2020
This is much like the January 2019 case of Covington Catholic, in which people on the internet, short on facts but high on mob rage, determined by themselves that they would ruin someone’s life based on erroneous charges on racism.
For the time being, Amy, like Nick Sandmann — the high school student baselessly accused of racism in the 2019 incident — has had her reputation ruined. In addition, Amy surrendered the dog to the rescue she adopted him from and is out of work. But unlike Sandmann, she is bowing to the social media mob.
In both cases, the rage mob did not wait for the facts. Facts do not really matter when you want to score woke points on the internet.
Cooper told CNN she wanted to “publicly apologize to everyone.”
“I’m not a racist. I did not mean to harm that man in any way,” she said.
But the mob will never be satisfied. No amount of begging forgiveness will ever be enough.
Truth and Accuracy
We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.
Advertise with The Western Journal and reach millions of highly engaged readers, while supporting our work. Advertise Today.
