Over the holiday weekend, a group of predominantly white militiamen took up guns and began occupying the government's Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters in Oregon, culminating in a tense standoff with law enforcement in the area. 
 
 It's a big story. This is an armed militia using the threat of violence to get the federal government to change the law — specifically, the gunmen want the feds to give up publicly managed land to local ranchers, loggers, and miners. And, yes, they are using the threat of violence: As Les Zaitz explained for the Oregonian, "In phone interviews from inside the occupied building Saturday night, Ammon Bundy and his brother, Ryan Bundy, said they are not looking to hurt anyone. But they would not rule out violence if police tried to remove them, they said." 
 
 Yet media outlets don't seem to consider this an alarming story, instead treating it by and large as a peaceful protest. Here, for instance, is an Associated Press tweet about the events: 
 
 Peaceful protest in Oregon rancher arson case followed by building takeover at national wildlife refuge: https://t.co/nsIKxQlyIu — The Associated Press (@AP) January 3, 2016 
 
 For many on social media, the reaction seems very different from how the media would react if, say, black or Muslim protesters with guns took over a government building instead of a predominantly white group. 
 
 The media's reaction to a group of armed people taking over a government building was timid 
 
 One would think that an armed group taking over a government building would be a big deal. The public certainly seems to think so, with #OregonUnderAttack trending on Twitter and Malheur National Wildlife Refuge trending on Facebook. 
 
 But media outlets mostly seemed to shrug at the situation, at least at first. Here is the New York Times's front page as of Sunday afternoon, when the story was relegated to a sidebar: 
 
 And here is Fox News's front page, where it's hard to even see the story right by one about a hoverboard robbery: 
 
 The coverage also generally had little language about the threat of violence. The AP, for example, characterized the protests as peaceful, and Fox News called the group in Oregon "armed protesters." 
 
 Several people on social media complained that this story was getting much less — or at least a different kind of — attention than it would have gotten if these were mainly black or Muslim protesters. Here's a sampling of some tweets, which don't encompass the entire conversation but get to a lot of what people are upset about: 
 
 Can we please get 1 Muslim to join the right-wing terrorist militia in Oregon so our media can cover it? — John Fugelsang (@JohnFugelsang) January 3, 2016 
 
 What's the difference between a terrorist cell and a militia? Religion and skin color. #OregonUnderAttack #GOP pic.twitter.com/mZiI0bQVDv — CDKing (@thedaleking) January 3, 2016 
 
 For those who don't understand why people say our criminal justice system is broken. #OregonUnderAttack pic.twitter.com/jfP7xXZSLf — Thor Benson (@thor_benson) January 3, 2016 
 
 Did I miss the call for the national guard in Oregon? I recall them in Ferguson and Baltimore. #OregonUnderAttack — rolandsmartin (@rolandsmartin) January 3, 2016 
 
 Generally, the sentiment is that if these were black or Muslim protesters, the media reports would be much more alarmed in nature. The media and public might not even call the militia members in Oregon "protesters," but instead refer to them as "thugs" or "terrorists." After all, that's exactly what happened with the Black Lives Matter protests over the past couple years. 
 
 The media reacted to black protesters over the past few years in a very different way 
 
 Behind these complaints is the media's very different reaction over the past few years to Black Lives Matter demonstrators protesting racial disparities in the criminal justice system and, specifically, police use of force. Those protests led media outlets not just to cover the demonstrations as wholly violent, but to suggest that the protests led to a wave of crime and violence in 2015. 
 
 For one, there were several instances in which victims of police shootings and Black Lives Matter protesters — even largely peaceful ones — were called thugs or other racially charged language. This is a problem that CNN, the New York Times, and Fox News all ran into. 
 
 But it went further. After a police officer was shot and killed in Texas, investigators in the case specifically said they had no idea what the motive of the shooter was. But that didn't stop Fox News from repeatedly pinning the blame on Black Lives Matter protesters, whom pundits blamed for fostering distrust and even hatred toward police: Fox News's Elisabeth Hasselbeck wondered aloud on air why Black Lives Matter isn't considered a "hate group." Bill O'Reilly was more blunt, concluding the movement was indeed a "hate group." And Megyn Kelly characterized the movement as violent and anti-police in another segment. 
 
 This continued to be a popular talking point among some news outlets, with the New York Post and Fox News repeatedly referencing a "war on cops." But with 2015 over, the data shows that the year was one of the safest years to be a police officer, with on-duty deaths of cops near historic lows and falling compared with 2014. 
 
 News outlets suggested that Black Lives Matter led to not just more violence against police but more violence in general. The New York Times, CNN, USA Today, and NPR ran stories about a supposed increase in murders and crimes in 2015, usually suggesting that protests against police were one factor. In a reference to the original Black Lives Matter protests in Ferguson, Missouri, this became known as the "Ferguson effect" — the idea that protests against police had demoralized police and emboldened criminals, leading to more crime. 
 
 While murder rates are significantly up in some US cities, crime is not. Throughout the year, criminologists also repeatedly cautioned that there's no evidence of a nationwide wave of violence; they've also said that there's no evidence that the Black Lives Matter protests have anything to do with a potential rise in violence. But that didn't stop the widespread media narratives of a "Ferguson effect." 
 
 Asked about the discrepancies, CNN law enforcement analyst Art Roderick suggested that the differences make sense because the Oregon protesters are in a largely empty rural area and "they're not destroying property, they're not looting anything." 
 
 But, while the Baltimore and Ferguson protests resulted in some rioting, the overwhelming majority of Black Lives Matter protests have been peaceful. And Black Lives Matter protesters never showed up to a rally with guns and vowed to take over a government building "for years" with the threat of deadly force, as those in Oregon have vowed. 
 
 As some people pointed out on social media, it's hard to imagine news outlets viewing an armed protest as peaceful if their racial, ethnic, or religious identity were different. 
 
 @AP When white people with guns takeover a federal building and threaten the lives of fed employees, it's a peaceful protest. — GoBrooklyn (@GoBrooklyn) January 3, 2016 
 
 Similar media standards seem to apply to Muslim Americans. After a terrorist attack, pundits are quick to suggest that the entire Muslim community should apologize for the tragedy — as if every Muslim is in someway culpable for it. (In a particularly egregious example, CNN anchor Don Lemon asked Muslim-American human rights lawyer Arsalan Iftikhar if he supports ISIS, drawing a clearly baffled Iftikhar to ask, as Lemon nodded, "Wait, did you just ask if I support ISIS?") But there are no comparable cries demanding that all white people apologize for the militiamen in Oregon. 
 
 To be clear, it's not that critics necessarily think the Oregon militiamen should be subjected to the same wild, unfounded accusations as black or Muslim people. The complaint, instead, is that the media seems to be quick to treat minority groups as violent, while giving a predominantly white group a pass even when it's heavily armed. 
 
 The public (and media) really do hold racial biases, even if they don't know it 
 
 Underlying the accusations of skewed reporting toward the media is what's known as "implicit bias," or subconscious prejudices that can change how we approach and treat people of a different race, ethnicity, and religious affiliation. Researchers have shown that this phenomenon is real time and time again. 
 
 As part of a study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in 2014, researchers studied 176 mostly white, male police officers, and tested them to see if they held an unconscious "dehumanization bias" against black people by having them match photos of people with photos of big cats or apes. Researchers found that officers commonly dehumanized black people, and those who did were most likely to be the ones who had a record of using force on black children in custody. 
 
 In the same study, researchers interviewed 264 mostly white, female college students and found that they tended to perceive black children ages 10 and older as "significantly less innocent" than their white counterparts. 
 
 "Children in most societies are considered to be in a distinct group with characteristics such as innocence and the need for protection," Phillip Goff, a UCLA researcher and author of the study, said in a statement. "Our research found that black boys can be seen as responsible for their actions at an age when white boys still benefit from the assumption that children are essentially innocent." 
 
 Other research suggests there can be superhumanization bias at work, as well, with white people more likely to associate paranormal or magical powers with black people than with other white people. And the more they associate magical powers with black people, the less likely they are to believe black people feel pain. 
 
 Subconscious racial biases are worrying because they may contribute to greater use of force by police. Studies show, for example, that officers are quicker to shoot black suspects in video game simulations. Josh Correll, a University of Colorado Boulder psychology professor who conducted the research, said it's possible the bias could lead to even more skewed outcomes in the field. "In the very situation in which [officers] most need their training," he said, "we have some reason to believe that their training will be most likely to fail them." 
 
 The fact these biases exist is at the very least something media outlets and pundits should be aware about in their reporting. Because the fact is such biases could be coloring how we approach these stories, even if we like to think that's not true. 
 
 Watch: Race isn't biologically real ||||| (CNN) The message was clear. One day before Dallas police officers were gunned down, the African American Defense League was telling anyone reading its Facebook page it was time to act. 
 
 The message delivered at 9:47 a.m. Wednesday came after news broke of yet another killing of a black man by a white police officer. Philando Castile was killed in the front seat of his car after being pulled over for a broken taillight outside Minneapolis. 
 
 The message from the African American Defense League left little up for interpretation. 
 
 "The Pig has shot and killed Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Louisiana!: You and I know what we must do and I don't mean marching, making a lot of noise, or attending conventions. We must "Rally The Troops!" It is time to visit Louisiana and hold a barbeque. The highlight of our occasion will be to sprinkle Pigs Blood!" 
 
 The apparent author of that post, Mauricelm-Lei Millere, has so far not responded to CNN's request for comment. But from his Facebook page, CNN has discovered the killer of five Dallas police officers had visited and "liked" the AADL's site. 
 
 Micah Johnson 's online history shows he followed dozens of sites that focused on injustices committed on the black community. He visited and liked several websites dedicated to Black Lives Matter and the New Black Panthers, along with the Nation of Islam and the Black Riders Liberation Party, two groups the Southern Poverty Law Center considers hate groups. 
 
 One friend who spoke to CNN said Johnson was obsessed with the plight of blacks in the United States and would repeatedly watch the now 25-year-old videotaped beating of Rodney King 
 
 "He was an expert on the history of the Martin Luther King assassination," the friend said. "And he studied Malcolm X." 
 
 The friend, who did not want to be named, also said Johnson had issues controlling his temper. "He was a good black man with a little bit of an anger problem." 
 
 Those who study the online radicalization of terrorists are seeing a similar pattern in the story of Johnson, a young man who may have been searching for identity and internalizing the hate and anger he was reading online. 
 
 "Extremist groups generally use propaganda in the hopes of influencing people," said J.M. Berger of the George Washington University Program on Extremism. "They are trying to encourage lone wolf attacks where someone will carry out an attack in the name of the ideology they believe in but not have any connection to the organization that is promoting the ideology." 
 
 Berger said it's a pattern that began with white supremacist groups 30 or 40 years ago. Terrorist groups like ISIS have taken the tactic online to social media. Now there is a concern groups considered black nationalist hate groups are employing the same tactics, and possibly inciting the same lone wolf style of violence. 
 
 "It's not clear that they are pursuing that as an organized strategy. But certainly they are putting out incendiary content and if someone who is inclined toward violence is reading that, they may fixate on that content as a reason to take action," Berger said. 
 
 One of those incendiary messages was posted then quickly deleted by the African American Defense League Thursday: "...calling on the gangs across the nation! Attack everything in blue..." 
 
 We may never know what, if any, online messages inspired or incited Johnson to attack Dallas police, but Berger said it's not insignificant that he showed affinity for this material. 
 
 On Thursday, the FBI sent a nationwide bulletin to law enforcement warning of online messaging that could inspire attacks against police. In the several-page warning, the FBI showed violent messaging that included the graphic depiction of a police officer's throat being cut. 
 
 Tom Fuentes, a former associate director with the FBI, said the messages and those behind them should be treated the same way the federal government investigates ISIS. 
 
 "It's no different than the ISIS propaganda that goes out," Fuentes said. "And the question 
 
 for law enforcement is where do you draw the line between free speech and something else? If a message is espousing someone to take action, even if they inspire one guy to strike out, isn't that enough?" 
 
 Fuentes said the FBI keeps track of hate groups online with the help of the Southern Poverty Law Center. But because the groups are mostly run by U.S. citizens, the FBI has larger barriers to what and how it can monitor groups protected by the right to free speech. 
 
 Fuentes said it's a fine line and "some of these groups seem to be walking right up to that line." 
 
 After the shootings and the death of Johnson, one of those Facebook sites devoted to the teachings of Elijah Mohammed took a page form the online playbook of ISIS and made the Dallas cop killer a martyr. 
 
 The site posted Johnson's photo with the message, "R.I.P." for the man who "stood up to injustice."
– An armed group has taken over a federal building in Oregon, and leaders say they're willing to use force to defend themselves if the feds move in. It's getting news coverage, of course, but a post at Vox makes the case that coverage is nowhere near as intense as it would be if this group were largely Muslim or black instead of mostly white. "Media outlets don't seem to consider this an alarming story, instead treating it by and large as a peaceful protest," writes German Lopez. He notes that after terrorists attacks, pundits often ask the Muslim community at large to denounce them, "but there are no comparable cries demanding that all white people apologize for the militiamen." It's a case of "implicit bias," writes Lopez, or "subconscious prejudices that can change how we approach and treat people of a different race, ethnicity, and religious affiliation." It's important that media outlets be aware of the problem, he adds, because the resulting coverage can skew how stories are perceived. Not that everyone's taking the threat all that seriously: A Daily Beast headline refers to "Wingnut Woodstock," while al Jazeera notes that the Internet seems to have settled on the name "Y'all Qaeda" to describe the group. Click to read Lopez's full post.