New York Times Magazine reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones is facing backlash for saying that destruction of property during the ongoing George Floyd protests "is not violence."
Conservatives are criticizing comments the reporter made during a Tuesday interview with CBS News.
"I think we need to be really careful with our language. Yes, it is disturbing to see property being destroyed. It is disturbing to see people taking property from stores, but these are things," Hannah-Jones said. "Violence is when an agent of the state kneels on a man's neck until all of the life is leached out of his body. Destroying property, which can be replaced, is not violence."
People have been protesting the death of a black man by a white police officer. Some of the demonstrations have turned violent and resulted in the looting of businesses.
"Using that same language to describe those two things ... it's not moral to do that," she added.
The reporter was bashed for her comments on social media by many conservatives.
“According to this logic, burning down a building isn’t an act of violence,” author Rich Lowry tweeted. “What a sophomoric and morally bankrupt defense of the indefensible.”
Conservative podcast and radio host Ben Shapiro mocked the Pulitzer Prize winner and called her comments “disgusting and stupid.”
"Disgusting and stupid comments," Shapiro wrote. "Such comments only deserve one response: a Pulitzer Prize."
Hannah-Jones won a Pulitzer Prize for her work on for the publication's "1619 Project," which focused on the 400th anniversary of when slavery began in the U.S.
Hannah-Jones clapped back at those criticizing her statements tweeting her comments were being misrepresented in an effort to “silence black journalists."
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