If we don't want to see excessive coverage of things like the Smollett case

...and I'm going back to not knowing who he was.

..when I first read what happened it was like 'OH well another person has been injured'....kinda like I feel after reading about a car wreck. Then I went on about my work. No further thought on it than that. Im SO TIRED of hearing about it. I want to know more about the guy who tried to kill us all or hear about roger stone.

If you create a fast, simple narrative involving a celebrity, intrigue, politics and race, people will jump on it every time.

The only way not to get caught up is not to watch cable news.

I did a quick comparison of the Washington Post and CNN's webpage right now. The Post has one story on an "Empire actor." CNN has 5 stories on "Smollet." It's clear they are speaking to different audiences. Which one do you want to be a part of?

and most people (aside from the media) knew it from the beginning.

I don't think people are surprised, or that it changes much when it comes to hate crimes.. we have the Coast Guard Trumper white nationalist who wanted to kill liberals, Dems, PoC etc.. and this is just the most recent in a long line of such incidents since Trump was elected.

It's my observation that this actually ramped up when Obama was elected in '08. Trump's presence accelerated it.

were the alt-right 'primordial soup' from which Trump emerged... were all a reaction to the election of the first black president and potentially the first female president.

Everyone obviously didn't know it was a hoax.

until more facts came out.

But I do think most regular people did feel from the beginning it was fishy, and are thus not really suprised by the outcome, though Trump/RW will use it to their advantage to minimalize the role Trumpism has in the rise of (real) hate crimes.

I also noticed some people voicing those suspicions here and they weren't popular.

what stories networks choose to cover, or how they choose to tell you a story. If you really don't want to see excessive coverage, turn it off.

. . . it isn't so simple. People aren't complaining that the Smollett case is being covered, they are complaining that the Smollett case is being covered as though Smollett tried to kill the President while the Christopher Paul Hasson case is being covered as though Hasson angrily mowed his neighbor's lawn because of the dandelions.