The 12 Best Tweets About CNN's 'Brown-Skinned Individual' Fail

As heartbroken as we are over Monday’s bombings in Boston, we can’t deny the unease we feel as pundits take to the airwaves to prematurely speculate about the perpetrators behind the heinous acts. Yesterday afternoon, CNN jumped the gun and began reporting that “dark-skinned individual” with “brown skin” had been arrested and was behind the act. Later in the afternoon, they modified the description to a “brown-skinned individual,” before eventually retracting the news.

As you can imagine, brown and dark skinned Twitter users had a field day discussing CNN’s grave error. Below are the 12 best tweets we found about the mixup. And while you’re at it, check out Rafat Ali’s new Tumblr, Brown Skinned Individual, created minutes after CNN’s report, and Stephen Colbert’s coverage of the rush to suspect a “dark-skinned male.”

Bombing Suspect: CNN confirms suspect is a “Brown skinned Male,” CBS confirms “White skinned Male,” we can confirm he has skin.

— GlobalGrind Politics (@GGPolitics) April 17, 2013

.@boston_police, can we confirm? RT @intelwire: My sources are telling me the bomber definitely has skin.

— Hayes Brown (@HayesBrown) April 17, 2013

PANDARUS : Faith, to say truth, brown and not brown.CRESSIDA : To say the truth, true and not true.(cc. @cnn)

— Teju Cole (@tejucole) April 18, 2013

CNN’s so called finest should just give up the pretense and apply for Dancing with the Stars. #BostonMarathon #darkskinmale

— Sonia Faleiro (@soniafaleiro) April 18, 2013

CNN describes the bomber as a white male, with brown hair, blue shirt & pants, and owner of a cat who hates Mondays & loves lasagna???

— Rob Fee (@robfee) April 17, 2013

CNN: Its a dark skinned guy. CBS: Its a white guy. So at this point the suspect is Michael Jackson. Great job, guys.

— Not Bill Walton (@NotBillWalton) April 17, 2013

https://twitter.com/SuburbanComa/status/324596551295053824

Disturbing that it’s OK for TV to ID a Boston bombing suspect only as “a dark-skinned individual.”

— gwen ifill (@pbsgwen) April 17, 2013

Dear MSM please give me a suspect so I can engage in meritless conjecture and blame a collective group for an individual’s criminal act.

— Wajahat Ali (@WajahatAli) April 17, 2013

BREAKING: “Dark-skinned” suspect identifies @cnn reporter as “thick-headed”.

— Oculus (@daddy_san) April 17, 2013

CNN’s John King says the Boston bombing suspect is a “dark-skinned male.” Once again, CNN shows its anti-Sicilian bias.

— Arif Rafiq (@ArifCRafiq) April 17, 2013