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'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

reason.com

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Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#31

Post by amadeuspagel »

youareostriches wrote: post #28
tomohawk wrote: post #16

Happened to a reporter on the Key bridge in DC. https://twitter.com/DailyCaller/status/1300857489559375877 EDIT: apparently "You're not allowed to Post" also applies

The Daily Caller has been managed by Tucker Carlson, who attacks protesters on the air virtually every day. The Daily Caller is known for right-wing troll articles. There’s no chance in hell that this publication would ever portray protesters favorably.

And therefore protestors have a right to prevent them from filming in a public space?

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#32

Post by sneak »

It makes me sad that an institution I used to like and respect, reason.com, seems more and more often to subscribe to the standard (and, taken uncritically, untrue) set pieces of the standard American culture war.

This one, in particular, that “antifa is a violent mob that is super hypocritical”, and also aliasing “antifa” and “blm” as coterminous.

The truth is very different, but I fear that many in their libertarian audience have shifted a lot more authoritarian in recent years, so it’s a logical evolution. It’s just super disappointing to see them regurgitating the off-the-shelf battle lines instead of digging for real.

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#33

Post by CalChris »

ppf wrote: post #6

If you spend any time on the Portland subreddit, you'll see plenty of stories and comments about how the city is just fine, and only Trump fans with an agenda push a "rioting and burning narrative". It's amazing watching hypocritical narrative control in action. These are the same people pushing for police body cameras.

I drove through and visited Portland on the way up to Seattle recently. Portland was a damn fine city.

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#34

Post by mc32 »

zaroth wrote: post #19

The mainstream news reporting on Portland (and other regional rioting) got to the point where they were bald-faced lying about peaceful protests standing in front of burning buildings. The most charitable interpretation I can think of is that these professional journalists think that their readers can’t understand a nuanced world of gray and need everything reduced to black and white. There can be a concept of “BLM”…

Obviously this is to control the narrative. Why would they shoo and have "minders" ala repressive regimes?

Is it because "fake news" (that'd be a tough sell coming from the left who question that assertion). Is it because they don't want people to see the underbelly of the movement or at least the bad elements in their movement?

What we do know is that if you are an organization looking for change, if you're not very careful, your well intended movement will be usurped by those who have ulterior motives --they will use your movement as "useful idiots" and you may ultimately loose control of your movement to demagogues.

There is a difference between people who are honestly looking to make things better and those riding such wave to enhance their own power.

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#35

Post by youareostriches »

mschuster91 wrote: post #15
cardamomo wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a really important perspective. Reporting of protests is not neutral, and neither is the police's response.

>and neither is the police's response. The police is almost never neutral when it comes to protests, not just in their tactics (just compare how easy the far-right gets away with even killing people at protests vs. how anything remotely left-wing is treated) but also in their press statements (e.g. see here for a police lie that activists had set a door knob under live electricity: https://taz.de/Polizei-Falschmeldun…

> The worst thing is many people do not realize this and treat police as "privileged sources", especially as many media outlets directly copy police press statements as facts instead of sending their own people to monitor and cross-check - because having "boots on the ground" costs money that too many outlets don't have any more.

There’s also the phenomenon of long-term crime-beat reporters taking on the perspective that the police are always correct, due to the implicit bias of reporting on “criminal behavior“. Moreover, such reporters need to maintain a working relationship with police in order to get the facts for their stories and often build friendships with police PR heads and prosecutors.

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#36

Post by sneak »

zaroth wrote: post #19

The mainstream news reporting on Portland (and other regional rioting) got to the point where they were bald-faced lying about peaceful protests standing in front of burning buildings. The most charitable interpretation I can think of is that these professional journalists think that their readers can’t understand a nuanced world of gray and need everything reduced to black and white. There can be a concept of “BLM”…

> The mainstream news reporting on Portland (and other regional rioting) got to the point where they were bald-faced lying about peaceful protests standing in front of burning buildings.

It’s a little bit cliche, but also true: to judge a protest by its most violent elements but to decline to do the same of the police is the language of the oppressor.

Everyone I saw celebrating 100 days was celebrating 100 days of sustained protesting—not violence. Those same people have bemoaned the escalation of violence that happens against the protests each night by police.

The fact that some of the protestors have turned violent is, to me, entirely reasonable considering the sustained months of police violence that have been inflicted upon them illegally. If the state wants people to respect the laws and remain peaceful, it needs to clean its own house of violent criminals first.

Ironically, that’s why the protests happened in the first place. Let’s not forget cause and effect.

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#37

Post by the-dude »

zaroth wrote: post #19

The mainstream news reporting on Portland (and other regional rioting) got to the point where they were bald-faced lying about peaceful protests standing in front of burning buildings. The most charitable interpretation I can think of is that these professional journalists think that their readers can’t understand a nuanced world of gray and need everything reduced to black and white. There can be a concept of “BLM”…

In my experience from the Dutch press, they are all very left leaning. Especially our public broadcasters.

There is hardly any right leaning press in The Netherlands.

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#38

Post by UncleSlacky »

josteink wrote: post #23
rbecker wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes it no less important to be aware of any bias in reporting. If only journalists that show the protests in a flattering light are allowed to film, then this should be mentioned every time footage from the protests is shown, and any "mostly peaceful" claims can and should be dismissed as unverifiable.

> any "mostly peaceful" claims can and should be dismissed as unverifiable I honestly thought “mostly peaceful” was a meme at this point. With cities on fire for months and months, how can anyone take such a claim seriously? Edit: Twitter seems to agree with me. https://twitter.com/search?q=%23MostlyPeaceful

According to this report, most BLM protests have been peaceful: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/05/nearly-all-bla...

original report here: https://acleddata.com/2020/09/03/demonstrations-political-vi...

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#39

Post by ceejayoz »

unishark wrote: post #22
ceejayoz wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cops have plenty of ways of going after people who haven’t committed crimes. https://projects.tampabay.com/projects/2020/investigations/p...

In other words, protestors are harassing, assaulting, and robbing reporters because they might otherwise be unjustly framed for minor crimes.

Or targeted with a “you should kill yourself” campaign like the FBI tried to do against King.

Re: 'You're Not Allowed to Film': The Fight to Control Who Reports from Portland

#40

Post by formercoder »

zaroth wrote: post #19

The mainstream news reporting on Portland (and other regional rioting) got to the point where they were bald-faced lying about peaceful protests standing in front of burning buildings. The most charitable interpretation I can think of is that these professional journalists think that their readers can’t understand a nuanced world of gray and need everything reduced to black and white. There can be a concept of “BLM”…

I’ve found that most people I speak to can’t accept that most issues are complex shades of gray. It’s all our team or their team based on whatever news channel they subscribe to. No one takes time to dig below the surface and think for themselves.
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