Tag: Media: The Dallas Express

Sources/Resources: The Dallas Express

Up to now I’ve been talking about news sources I read or at least wouldn’t turn up my nose at when they turn up on Google. Today I’m going to talk about one that I wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole other than to check out the two-minute hate from our billionaire would-be overlords. That’s the Dallas Express, the pink slime subsidiary of Monty Bennett, a local hotel magnate with political aspirations and money to burn.

The Express is built on the good name of a Black newspaper that covered Dallas from 1892 to 1970. The current operation was founded four years ago. The history is covered pretty nicely in this Texas Observer article by Steven Monacelli from 2023. There’s also quite a bit more about Bennett and the Observer in this profile of Bennett detailing his involvement in the Dallas HERO astroturf group that was behind Props S, T, and U on the Dallas charter amendment ballot last November. (Bennett lives in Highland Park, of course, so he’s not even in the city of Dallas.) The gist of the 2024 article is that Bennett uses paid protestors to get at his enemies, then reports on the protests and complains that no other press outlet is covering them. Regular readers will also notice that Pete Marocco is mentioned in the 2024 article in connection with Dallas HERO, where he was parked for some of the time between his last stint at USAID and his current job destroying it.

The point here is that the Dallas Express, despite claiming to be a nonprofit and an objective news source, is anything but. It’s a vanity project of Monty Bennett and nothing you read there should be taken seriously other than as a signpost to what Bennett and his cronies want.

People with dirty minds see a lot of dirt

A story I’ve been keeping an eye on while I scramble out from under the piles of stories from international, national, state, and local sources is the seizure of photographs from the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. The Modern had an exhibit of Sally Mann photographs that closed at the beginning of this month. Among the many photographs in the exhibit were four photos of her then-young children naked. After some community outrage, Fort Worth PD showed up to seize the photos in January.

Now the ACLU of Texas, FIRE, and the National Coalition Against Censorship have gotten together to write a letter to FWPD describing the seizure as unconstitutional censorship. Nobody seems to have anything to say to local media; the museum and FWPD are keeping mum.

Here’s the thing: I haven’t seen these photographs, but I’m old enough to remember when toddler bathtime photos were considered normal and not sexual exploitation of children. I’m glad my bathtime photos aren’t on the internet, a topic that brings up questions of consent, and I certainly can see how putting naked photos of your little kids in an art exhibition brings up the same questions. But artistic nudity, especially where little kids are concerned, is real. If any photo of a naked kid you ever see is sexual, or even pornographic, in your eyes, you have a problem.

The Modern had noted that the Mann exhibit had mature content, which I understand is necessary in the GOP-led city of Fort Worth, but honestly photos of little kids running around naked shouldn’t need that label. Nor should the Cowboy exhibit at the Amon Carter Museum around the corner have had to post a warning because the exhibit included a painting of two men kissing. Tarrant County has a prudish bully in County Judge Tim O’Hare, who commented on the Mann exhibit on Xitter. And of course the Dallas Express had to have its say back in December. These are the folks who think photos of child nudity are inherently sexual. They’re the ones with the dirty minds, and the problem.