Anarchist Blogger Rightly Spends 200 Days In Jail

This story about a man self described as "an artist, an activist, an anarchist and an archivist" is no doubt going to be used by some to bolster the idea that our free press is under siege, and that we need more "journalist privilege" rules for the very sake of democracy. (Most of those people - coincidentally - will make their living at newspapers, know bloggers and other online media are obliterating their circulation numbers and profits, and merely want to make their club more exclusive.) But it actually says just the opposite - that such rules are absurd, arguably unconstitutional, and certainly unworkable.

Here's what happened:

Josh Wolf, a 24-year-old blogger, has spent more than six months behind bars in California -- the longest contempt-of-court term ever served by someone in the media -- for refusing to turn over a videotape he shot of a violent San Francisco demonstration against a Group of Eight summit meeting. Unless a mediation session today can break the impasse, he will likely remain imprisoned at least until the current grand jury's term expires in July.
***
Wolf taped the anarchists' San Francisco protest, against a G-8 summit meeting in Scotland, in July 2005. One police officer, Peter Shields, had his skull fractured by a hooded assailant with a pipe or baseball bat. Three people were charged in the attack. Police say protesters also put a mattress under Shields's police car and tried to set it on fire.

The First Amendment makes us ALL journalists by birthright, and the Internet gives reality to this great promise. Some journalists are professionals, but enough of us are part-timers (especially now) that any definition that would include this guy would necessarily include more US citizens that it would exclude. The Constitution and subsequent amendments made no provision for an insulated journalist class, nor should it have. Creating standards to define "real" journalists only limits the proliferation of a robust, diverse, and free information distribution system that is accessible to all.

In other words, journalist shield laws passed in the name of a free press would actually abridge that free press, in direct contravention of the clear language of the First Amendment.

We are all citizens with the same rights to see, report, publish, and disseminate information. We are also all citizens with the same responsibilities to our justice system - to report for jury duty when asked, to answer subpoenas when served, and to testify truthfully at a tribunal when properly summoned. No penumbra emanating from anywhere grants an exception just because you happen to own a New York Times press pass - or a blog URL.

I'm just glad the judge in this case has the fortitude to keep him in jail, refusing to let justice take a back seat to big-media pressure groups.

Journalist Shield Laws and Community Responsibility

The Minnesota Daily, the independent campus newspaper of my alma mater, the University of Minnesota, recently wrote an editorial griping that the campus police weren't doing more to prevent bike theft or catch bike thieves. The response by the Chief of UMPD is classic:

Lastly, we definitely rely on student collaboration. An example would be last year when a Daily photographer captured a bicycle thief in the act behind Coffman Union, voluntarily offered to turn the photos over to officers only to be overruled by Daily editors under their mistaken impression the event was protected by the "“shield law."” It is disingenuous in the extreme that the Daily editorial staff would pontificate about a lack of UMPD commitment to protecting student property while abdicating your own duty as citizens.

I love it. Full disclosure, though, when I was a student at Minnesota I worked for the UMPD, and often made fun of the Daily for sucking.

This is a great illustration of why such "shield laws" are so dumb. And as I've written before, because the First Amendment makes us all journalists by birthright, it takes a hard core elitist to think that just because you have press pass that you're somehow above the duties and responsibilities that come with being a citizen.

"Journalist Privilege" Harms Free Speech

This New York Post editorial sums up nicely why the media has lost our trust. In short, it points to Woodward and Bernstein as harming the country beyond measure by inspiring generations of young journalists to make it their mission to take down (or at the very least to challenge) The Man.

In fact, you could use All the President's Men to teach a course in journalistic ethics, using it as an example of what NOT to do - using anonymous sources without corroboration, revealing high level, sensitive information without considering their consequences, and making a mission out of taking down a politician. I'm not excusing Nixon, but his bad acts cannot justify theirs.

Now, journalists want to legally protect this type of bad behavior by creating a "journalist-source" privilege that would protect them from revealing such communications in a legal proceeding. They sanctimoniously note that they "have a duty to tell the public everything they learn, which is The Truth", while omitting or downplaying information that may not comport with their pre-established world view. (Case in point, the reporting on the US Economy.) The problem is that doing so would necessitate defining the word "journalist", and doing so in such a way that creates a de facto "official, licensed journalist." That would give the industry a larger chokehold, giving them an edge over bloggers, startups, and other ordinary citizens who want to get the word out. And that, as any corporation-phobic hippy will surely tell you, is a threat to a robust free and diverse press.

The First Amendment makes EVERY American citizen a journalist by birthright. The Internet makes that even more of a reality, with easy access to the ability to publish world wide. But we also have responsibilities as citizens, one of which is to cooperate with criminal investigations and to not harm our nation in time of war.

Journalists should remember that they are human beings first, then Americans, and THEN journalists. If their reporting of key facts assists the enemy in an armed conflict, they have an obligation to refrain from publishing those facts. If they are privy to information about a criminal affair, the "Public Right to Know" should not somehow supersede the right of the criminal justice system at a public trial to also know those important facts. If their reporting aids international terrorists by undermining the war against them, and by legitimizing suicide bombers on school busses as "militants" or "freedom fighters", then they have lost their humanity.

This is not to say that they necessarily should be silenced. But they should be condemned by all Americans, and by all people who think saving lives and promoting freedom is worth more than their job.