minorities are illegal immigrants...

Larson’s “Media and Minorities” describes the limited representation of Native Americans, Hispanics, and Asian Americans in the news media. Hispanics, in particular, are only covered in one-percent of the news, according to studies of the 1990’s. Often, Hispanics are only covered in the news if there is a story depicting them as criminals or illegal immigrants. Perhaps because of a limited understanding of minority groups, there is also a problem of violent representation of Native Americans. Early media coverage of Native Americans depicted violence and aggression towards whites, representing them as savage warriors. These stereotypes still hang on in some ways, but it is now common for them to be portrayed as general problems or nuisances to American society.
There is rarely a distinction made between the various groups of Hispanics, who could be from a number of countries. Hispanic individuals are often immediately associated with immigrant stereotypes. This immigrant-stereotype is also common for Asian Americans in news media. The reason that Vietnamese-American received the majority of Asian-American coverage in New York Times over the course of 60 years was because of stories about Vietnamese immigrants.
This news story, for example, made it to the Oklahoma City news – it involved the question of policemen stereotyping Mexican’s as illegal immigrants and a Mexican man who is not a U.S. citizen. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbgZKwytWL0
It is interesting because they do interview the Mexican man, Rivas, who was arrested, as well as his attorney, but does the white policeman’s statement outweigh theirs? The story does not come to a definite solution because the journalists cannot find proof that this man is or is not employed in the U.S. In the case of this news story, I am wary of both sides: the policeman says they won’t target Mexican license plates because “that would be profiling,” but I have trouble believing that. I agree with the attorney that police probably keep a close eye on cars driven by Mexicans, assuming that they would be illegal immigrants. Then again, it also sounds pretty suspicious when the man says “his brother” has a job at ‘Johnny Carinos’, not him. The news coverage leaves a feeling of mistrust for this man because the viewers are left unsure of his honesty or his status in our country. With limited coverage of Mexicans, news like this may leave viewers with a single impression of them.