| Friend,
May 3 was World Press Freedom Day, a day that recognizes the journalists worldwide who expose wrongdoing, challenge power and seek the truth. This year, we especially admire the student-run news outlets that are covering the often brutal police crackdowns against pro-Palestinian encampments set up to protest what students consider to be genocide happening in Gaza.
If coverage of the crackdowns results in any Pulitzers, the awards should go to cub reporters like those at Columbia University’s student-run radio station WKCR, and not to those members of the corporate press who’ve relied more on their virtual Rolodexes of official sources than on the sort of shoe-leather reporting that gets closer to revealing what’s actually happening on college campuses.
School administrators have called in police to conduct sweeps at dozens of protest encampments nationwide, often echoing the law-enforcement claim that “outside agitators” are leading the campus movement. Unfortunately, many in the media establishment have aligned their reporting and commentary with these demonstrably false views.
Students aren’t mere pawns in some larger geopolitical scheme: In truth, this is a well-organized, student-run movement that seeks to compel their schools to divest any financial support from a state that’s perpetrating atrocities that have killed tens of thousands of civilians in Gaza.
Prior to police involvement, most of the student protests were peaceful — though there were reported instances of antisemitism that must be universally condemned. The violence at Columbia only started once university leadership ignored students and faculty and opened campus gates to a heavily militarized police force.1
This escalation — prompted by the very institutions that purport to support and protect young minds — sparked a backlash: Student protesters have built and expanded encampments on campuses across the country. These acts of solidarity drew front-page attention, but through the distorted lens of some establishment media claiming that it’s the students who are on the attack: - The Wall Street Journal even published an Op-Ed claiming that Hamas is coordinating and “grooming” student activists for acts of terrorism.2
- ABC3 and Fox4 portrayed mass arrests as a “clash” between protesters and police when most available footage clearly shows law enforcement as the aggressors.5
Professional journalists could help their readers better understand the protests by covering the complicated money trail between university endowments and the military-industrial complex that arms repressive regimes worldwide.6 Instead, they’re acting as stenographers for local-police spokespeople at press conferences held far from the campus protests.
So who’s on campus? Despite police efforts to bar them from reporting freely, student journalists, like those reporting for Columbia’s WKCR, waded into the protests to livestream the brutal reality of police crackdowns.7
At Columbia, police eventually ordered WKCR reporters to get off campus. “Frankly, no one is left to document what’s happening,” one reporter responded on air.
Failures in our overly commercial media system have helped normalize unconstitutional ideas about state violence against dissenting voices. U.S. media firms make money via advertising: When commercial outcomes dictate your success, catering to wealth and power matters more than keeping that same power in check.
A recent study from the University of Pennsylvania found that countries with the most support for noncommercial media had the highest levels of engagement in democracy.8 To foster a public-interest media system that gives voice to dissenting views, we must create public structures to support the likes of WKCR and other noncommercial outlets.
While this approach doesn’t pretend to answer all of the questions about the media’s role in service of democracy, it recognizes that a strong independent noncommercial media system can serve as a bulwark against democracy-destabilizing forces.
We have tireless student reporters across the nation to thank for teaching us this important lesson.
In solidarity,
Tim and the rest of us at Free Press
freepress.net
P.S. It’s in our name: Free Press is eternally committed to defending press freedom, and we rely on the support of folks like you to make that possible.
1. “Is Columbia in Crisis?” The Columbia Daily Spectator, April 18, 2024 2. “Who’s Behind the Anti-Israel Protests,” The Wall Street Journal, April 22, 2024 3. “Police Clash With College Protesters Across the Country,” ABC News, May 1, 2024 4. “Police on UCLA Campus Monitoring Protest,” FOX 5 New York, May 2, 2024 5. “Rutgers Protesters Clear Out After Reaching Deal With Administrators,” The New York Times, May 2, 2024 6. “Arms Sales to Repressive Regimes Are More Than Just a Human Rights Issue,” Responsible Statecraft, Jan. 6, 2022 7. “WKCR News Coverage: CUAD Students Occupying Columbia,” WKCR, April 30, 2024 8. “Funding Democracy: Public Media and Democratic Health in 33 Countries,” University of Pennsylvania, Dec. 13, 2021  |
