Why are some Ebola patients portrayed as criminals, others as heroes?

[Ptarmigan]

Why are some Ebola patients portrayed as criminals, others as heroes?
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2014/10/thomas_eric_duncan_and_craig_spencer_race_nationality_and_rhetoric_of_ebola.html

Thomas Eric Duncan was the first person to die of Ebola in America; Craig Spencer is the first case of Ebola in New York City. With only a handful of cases in the United States, attention is rightly being paid to the measures being taken to prevent further spread of the deadly disease. But as we take all appropriate physical precautions, we should not forget that there is a different kind of danger. It lies in the way that we talk about Ebola and, most importantly, its victims. And there is a stark and troubling contrast in the way that people talked about Duncan and the way that they are talking about Spencer.

By all accounts, Duncan acquired Ebola by performing an act of nobility and grace: He assisted a pregnant woman who was badly ill. He said from the start that he did not think she had Ebola but that she was simply suffering from pregnancy complications. And so he therefore said on his health screening form upon departing Liberia for America that he had had no contact with anyone with the disease. Now, after his death, it is generally accepted that he was telling the truth as he understood it. But when he was first identified, the situation was very different.

On Oct. 2, the Liberian government announced that it might seek to prosecute him upon his return to Liberia “if it is determined that he made a false declaration.” The ambiguity of that “if” was immediately eviscerated by Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the president of Liberia, who proclaimed, “The fact that he knew and he left the country is unpardonable. … [He] put some Americans in a state of fear, and put them at some risk.” Headlines blared that “Ebola Patient in Dallas Lied on Screening Form,” with the qualification “Liberian Airport Official Says” relegated to an afterthought.

Slate has to bring race into this.

It is, however, hard not to think that Duncan and Spencer were talked about differently because of the ways in which they are different. The unemployed foreign black man was rhetorically positioned as a criminal, a terrorist, an animal. The wealthy, white American doctor is a humanitarian hero.

Really?

[Big Dog]

It is, however, hard not to think that Duncan and Spencer were talked about differently because of the ways in which they are different.

In other words, screw the facts. The writer's preconceived bias is the point of the rest of this article.

[DumbAss Tanker]

Probably because one set of them act out of egotism and the other set acts out of altruism.  The Maine nurse strikes me as someone who appears to be acting out of altruism originally, but is actually doing what she does for entirely egotistical reasons.

[Dori]

In other words, screw the facts. The writer's preconceived bias is the point of the rest of this article.

So what does Slate say about nurse Amber Vinson?  Is she also considered a criminal because she's black?

[obumazombie]

Libs drag us right back to looking at the whole world through racist colored lenses. Not sure but I think I banned the use of the word "colored".
I do make it a point to separate the colored from the whites.

[Big Dog]

Libs drag us right back to looking at the whole world through racist colored lenses. Not sure but I think I banned the use of the word "colored".
I do make it a point to separate the colored from the whites.

Separate but equal laundry is raaaaacist!

[Ralph Wiggum]

The only logical answer is that there can be only one hero...0bama.

[thundley4]

Probably because one set of them act out of egotism and the other set acts out of altruism.  The Maine nurse strikes me as someone who appears to be acting out of altruism originally, but is actually doing what she does for entirely egotistical reasons.

I think her fighting the quarantine is just helping to support Obama's position on not banning flights .