-------
Dad And Daughter Launch News Blog To Help Empower Southeast Queens
By Kamau & Nzinga Austin
How often do you hear positive news on the major media about Southeast Queens? Probably not nearly enough right? The major media promotes negative, violent, and awful sensational news. Ironically the people of Southeast Queens have always and still today are doing incredible and amazing things and somebody has to showcase our ingenuity.
In mainstream media they have an adage or saying "if it bleeds it leads." They play on the fact bad news travels faster than good news. They in a sense bank off of the bad news that happens in communities (largely of Blacks and people of color) to increase viewership and sell ads.
However, this negative coverage of our communities contributes to negative stereotypes of Black, working class, and people of color. It also contributes to the break down of the sense of community because we only hear about bad things in our areas.
Neighbors aren't as friendly as they used to be. People don't know each other the way they did back in the day when I was growing up. Residents in places like Harlem, East New York, and Southeast Queens are treated too often like suspects by law enforcement.
Before the controversy with Netflix, Starbucks, and Waffle House my daughter and I saw the need to promote our community businesses for economic development and empowerment. It just seemed obvious that when we supported organic businesses in our community we were also investing in our community.
In mainstream media they have an adage or saying "if it bleeds it leads." They play on the fact bad news travels faster than good news. They in a sense bank off of the bad news that happens in communities (largely of Blacks and people of color) to increase viewership and sell ads.
However, this negative coverage of our communities contributes to negative stereotypes of Black, working class, and people of color. It also contributes to the break down of the sense of community because we only hear about bad things in our areas.
Neighbors aren't as friendly as they used to be. People don't know each other the way they did back in the day when I was growing up. Residents in places like Harlem, East New York, and Southeast Queens are treated too often like suspects by law enforcement.
Before the controversy with Netflix, Starbucks, and Waffle House my daughter and I saw the need to promote our community businesses for economic development and empowerment. It just seemed obvious that when we supported organic businesses in our community we were also investing in our community.
This can help recycle dollars, create local
jobs, and also enhance property values because our neighborhoods would
have vibrant business sectors making them more viable and not be mired
with blighted business strips. We also believed cultural enrichment
was vital to enhancing the quality of life of our communities.
We posted over 1,000 events and articles about cultural events,
business profiles, and provocative editorial about economic development
within a year's time. Many of these postings were for free to promote
the community.
Many times we didn't even get a thank you. But we
didn't feel bad we were helping showcase the best in our community.
We'd do it for free if we could. Obviously, we can't do it forever that
way.
We're looking to grow from our 30,000 to 45,000 site visits
a month to much larger. We are quickly approaching closer to 60,000
site visits a month soon. And that is only 5% of our potential.
We are planning to get professional broadcast video equipment and branch
into doing community themed documentaries, webisodes, and video
interviews and so much more. We'll keep you posted. Thanks for your
support we could not have accomplished this without you our viewers.
Since you are here, if you appreciate the positive events, news, business profiles, job postings and coverage of economic empowerment in Southeast Queens why don't you support our efforts and donate? All donations are appreciated ($5, $10, $15, $20, +) Please make your contribution below...
Donate
Checkout Similar Articles Below
About the Southeast Queens Scoop - is the premier website and only publication offering daily news and updates on the events, culture, issues, and is dedicated to the business and economic development in this largely black historic community.
No comments:
Post a Comment