Recently, a Pittsburgh television station has ended its professional relationship with one of their tenured TV news anchors. Wendy Bell is now officially not connected with Hearst Television, according to USAToday.
Some called it a "social media career suicide." Her actions were the result of a shooting at a cookout that left five people dead. The incident included a pregnant woman and her unborn child. While no arrests have been made from the crime, Bell, who is caucasian, said it didn't take a "criminal profiler to draw a mental sketch of the killers."
Her post has been deleted but her statement already spread like wildfire. She had written that "They are young black men, likely teens or in their early 20s... have multiple siblings from multiple fathers and their mothers work multiple jobs. These boys have been in the system before. They've grown up there. They know the police. They've been arrested."
Her Facebook post had gone viral and were viewed as insensitive and racist. However, Bell had apologized for her actions but felt it was unfair to be handled sharply by the TV station.
The Pittsburgh community has gone to Twitter to make the announcement official to the public. The post reads: "WTAE-TV fires news anchor Wendy Bell following Facebook incident." It has so far garnered more than 8000 retweets and more than 3000 likes.
Bell was reportedly charged with a comment she made about a local shooting that was posted on Facebook. WTAE-TV felt that Bell's comments were "inconsistent with the company's ethics and journalistic standards."
Many people condemned the comments, others came to Bell's defense and applauded her honesty.
While it is no secret that today's decade is much more open to diversity, her remarks have deemed her unprofessional and closed to diversity. Her apology did not encourage her return to the TV headquarters.
