Josh Wolf, a blogger whose 7 1/2 months in jail is now on record as the longest-held journalist in US history, was released today in Dublin, CA. He finally handed over, to the feds, his video footage of a protest in S.F (to protest the G8 Summit in Scotland) where a police officer was assaulted when protesters were forced from the streets by the police.
I admire Josh for standing his ground as a blogger who writes journalistic pieces and for protecting his sources as he developed a story. Why should he or any other journalist give up their sources, video or otherwise, when gathering sources and information for a story, whether for a print publication owned by the Wall Street Journal, or a piece for an independent Internet site?
This case will lay the groundwork for how we determine the blurry lines between observer, user-generated content, blogger, journalist, pundit, media, and activist.
While I certainly do not condone the behavior of some protesters who assaulted police officers, we have a growing police state in this country that supresses free speech, democracy and the right to public assembly.
I have watched it happen right before my very eyes. People I know have said that if you’re not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about. Tell that to the hundreds of activists being rounded up at the Republican National Convention, or in Miami, arrested, when all they were doing was peacefully protesting. I have been told to stop filming my video camera in public in this country, but never while I was videotaping in Cuba. There’s something very wrong with that.
You can bet that there are journalists in Washington D.C covering much worse crimes (and keeping sources secret) than the one that Josh Wolf didn’t actually witness or video-tape. If you check out Josh’s tape, you’ll see that there is no evidence in it, just people telling stories and conversing about policies. Yet, he was jailed for not handing over this tape to the Feds. Perhaps the NSA needed more people like the Quakers to wiretap for Bush.
I support journalists keeping their sources confidential. Without that privilege, many corporate and political whistleblowers would never have been able to speak the truth without fear of retribution.
I’m getting involved in some local independent media issues. Our public media is like the old public plazas and community commons, and it’s being sold to the highest bidders. We may soon lose our community media, free press and public access. We need to charge the media companies rent for the public airwaves, and we need to hold them to higher standards on radio, tv and in print. It’s insane what dj’s can say these days on the air!
I’ll post again about the specific changes we need to ask for from the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) and why it’s important for us all and especially our kids.
Read more about how you can speak out about protecting our independent and community media. http://www.freepress.net/
If you’re interested in some other violations of our “democratic” nation, like how the White House has been pressuring the EPA to weaken laws passed by Congress or how the US and Australia are the only countries resisting to doing even an incredibly negligible amount to stop climate change, read this: Truthout.org.
-Kathy
