Letters to the Editor
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First amendment rights
We take our first amendment rights for granted. Any assault on them is a daggar aimed at the heart of our freedoms. You can see this by reading a great new book by Richard C. Cook--"Challenger Revealed: An Insider's Account of How the Reagan Administration Caused the Greatest Tragedy of the Space Age." It's one of the great whistleblower stories of all time and could only be written in America.
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Hogging evidence
There's something that vaguely bothers me about all of this. The lines are very fuzzily drawn. I wonder, at which point is a private citizen justified in withholding evidence? At which point exercising one's inalienable First Amendment right becomes obstruction of justice?
Judith Miller was a much more high-profile "jailed journalist" in recent years, but because she was not an anarchist but rather a pro-government hack people don't seem to clamor about her "martyrdom" just so much. That's because she was shielding Scooter Libby from sweet justice rather than a bunch of stone-throwers from the clutches of a DA. At what point do private citizens have the right to insist on not cooperating with investigations?
I am not arguing one way or another. I'm merely suggesting that there is a very serious issue at stake here, a conflict between the individual and the state that needs to be taken and treated very very seriously. Law enforcement is nothing without informers, just watch the cop series on TV. But cooperation with authorities is lauded or deplored depending on context, and context is, of course, in the eye of the beholder.
I wouldn't call this guy a martyr: martyrs have a cause. What is his cause? To stick it to the Man? To show us that cooperating with authorites (at any time, anywhere) is for the whimps and that real strong people refuse to cooperate? To remind us that we have a First Amendment? But I don't know what to call this guy instead. The whole matter is confused and murky, and his pronouncements do not shed any light on the matter, they merely confuse things further.
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acceptable actions by judge
I am even more confused after reading this article. If Wolf was at the march in the capacity as a journalist, or even blogger, than some of what he is saying holds up. But he wasn't.
The simple fact is Wolf was part of the anarchist group (he has admitted this previously) that marched that night and caused the damage. so doesn't that make him their documentarian and therefore biased? the judge had every right to ask for the tape based upon these facts and it is understandable he would question Wolf's statement that there was no evidence on the tape, I am sure he was assuming that Wolf would protect his friends. there were many crimes committed that night and the government has every right to collect information.
Add to this Wolf's interview a couple of days ago where he says he would have to think about whether or not he would have filmed protestors beating a policeman, then we have someone who has very little respect for the journalism profession and whose integrity is very questionable. who would want their news from this guy?
when you have people like Wolf manipulating the facts and calling himself a journalist is it any wonder journalists aren't trusted anymore?
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Journalists aren't trusted not because of Wolf
We can argue about whether Wolf was a documentarian or a journalist all we want, but that's beside the point when it comes to why journalists aren't trusted.
Journalists aren't trusted because of institutional behavior in which insider access is more important than reporting. Journalists aren't trusted because they appear more interested in being stenographers than reporters. Journalists aren't trusted because the most important news stories to them are the color of Anna Nicole's bloomers or whether TomKat are breaking up. They apply no judgment to their stenography, they conflate every story into he-said/she-said, and they are more interested in controvery, even when it's fabulized, than actual investigation.
Wolf isn't even a blip on the radar screen when it comes to our feelings about journalists.
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RE: Why bother reading the piece...
...when the subtitle is 'Josh Wolf tells Salon why he spent 226 days in prison rather than comply with a subpoena, and gives his take on what a "journalist" is'.
I find it completely condescending to write "journalist" and colors your necessary goal of objectivity.
Shame...I find Josh Wolf a completely valuable study-guide for today's changing landscape of journalism and information vs. government run amuck.
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He forgot to print himself a press pass.
This guy is more than a journalist than most journalists. He actually got his hands dirty documenting the news. Why is it that we consider a corporate paid flack who sits on his or her ass and does nothing more than rewrite the administration's press released talking points...a journalist, and not Josh Wolf? This guy has courage. He gave up the principle when he realized that the rest of America is too lazy and passive to cry for his and their freedoms. He threw in the towel when he realized that the main stream media wasn't going to fight for him either.
How easily people here kow to authority. Obstructing justice my ass. This is the same day that the prosecutor in the Duke case is on the hot seat for manufacturing a case against innocent people. Why should any citizen, journalist or not, be compelled to aid a prosecution in our troubled, broken, and unjust justice system?
Someone here asks who would want to get their news from Josh Wolf? Answer: me.
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Journalist is an empty term
To be a journalist you don't have to take an oath, you don't have to pass an exam. You don't need any training, you don't need to follow a code of ethics. You don't need to be good at anything or knowledgable in any way. Many people that we consider journalists simply read a teleprompter.
Journalism can be considered a career, but we allow for "citizen journalists" and "student journalists."
Is Glenn Greenwald a journalist? He practices journalism better than they (official journalists) do - yet they are the journalists and he is not?
To be an electrician you have to be able to wire things together. To be a computer programmer you have to do able to program. To be a journalist you need what? To be able to read and write? Is that it?
We cling to this notion of the fourth estate, about performing a valuable service, protecting the public interest. Some journalists do that - most do not. In theory that is what separates journalists from writers - but in reality there is no distinction. It is increasingly difficult to argue otherwise.
Mainstream media has abandoned its role as protector and informer. Media members don't practice what we consider ideal journalism any more than anyone else. If we are going to call them journalists, we may as well call anyone a journalist.
Really, the Glenn Greenwalds of the world are the real journalists, and the mainstream media members pretenders.