***The complete post is on NewsBusters***
Things got emotionally heated during ABC’s The View on Wednesday as co-host Whoopi Goldberg raged at the Austin American-Statesman newspaper out of Texas after they published a leaked surveillance video from inside the Uvalde elementary school during the massacre. Yelling at the camera, Goldberg spit at the paper (or at least pretended to) and demanded to know “what the hell” they were thinking by leaving in the sound of gunshots (while also initially leaving in the sounds of crying and screaming children).
“This story really, really makes me insane,” Goldberg declared leading into the “hot topic.” “Now, many parents of victims are outraged this was released, but the paper is defending their decision.” She then launched into a takedown that ends with her spitting at the paper:
I find it indefensible. I'm sorry. You -- you -- you forgot that attached to all those sounds are people's children. And you didn't have to do this. They were going to see this video on Sunday. You did not have to release this video and leak it. And I think it's appalling and you should be ashamed of yourselves for doing that, for being thoughtless about the parents who have to relive this every day because it's on television. Every time you turn around, you got to see it, you know. And I don't know if you guys over at that newspaper have kids, but shame on you! Shame on -- I know it doesn't mean anything coming from me, but [spits] shame on you!
Co-host Sunny Hostin agreed that the families should have seen the video first (they were set to see the video on Sunday, but the leak came out first). But that gave way to the point “you have to balance freedom of the press and the need for the public to see certain things and, of course, privacy.”
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