Before, during & after J20
Corporate media try to bleep out protests
By Gery
Armsby
Thousands of print, TV, radio and Internet media personnel
were on hand for the inauguration of President George W. Bush
on Jan. 20. How could this massive media presence have failed
to cover the huge anti-Bush protests all over Washington and
in many other U.S. cities?
Didn't they see the demonstrations? Was there confusion
over what the protests were about? Was it a collective but
benign error of omission?
Or was it a highly coordinated effort between the
corporate-dominated media and the government, including
multiple police agencies, to spare the new administration the
embarrassment of reporting the presence of tens of thousands
of angry, often militant protesters who far outnumbered
Bush's supporters along the parade route?
On Jan. 21, the front pages of every major newspaper
published in North America were filled with pictures and
words glorifying and legitimizing Bush's foul ascendancy to
the White House. Yet news of the mass protests was relegated
to the back pages or, presumably, the editors'
wastebaskets.
Cable and broadcast TV networks like CNN, MSNBC, Fox and
ABC carried live coverage of the inauguration. Each repeated
the same bare minimum of information about protests,
dismissing them as "not causing the security problems that
were expected" or "loud but well contained."
This type of reporting along the parade route was a
pitiful substitute for any substantive commentary about the
predominance of anti-Bush protesters clearly visible on
camera and audible on tape.
Flurry of media interest
before protests
In the days and weeks before the inauguration, reporters
constantly pursued protest organizers for information about
demonstration plans. Many attended pre-inaugural news
conferences held by organizers from the International Action
Center and other groups and lawyers from the Partnership for
Civil Justice. At these well-attended news conferences,
organizers explained protest plans and disseminated
information about the status of protest permits and the
legality of security checkpoints.
Some reporters asked permission to follow organizers
around for periods of time to observe them in action in the
days before Jan. 20.
C-SPAN aired two of the news conferences in their
entirety, and then repeated them.
One result of the exposure was that organizers received an
enormous response from the public.
Another development that may have resulted from the
exposure was a media pullback several days before the
protests.
Stories filed for the Washington Post and ABC World News
Tonight, based on reporters' extensive interviews with IAC
leaders, were mysteriously put on hold. This was done at the
very time that a groundswell of organizing activity was
building the protests.
Rather than carrying the stories that more or less
presented the protesters' point of view of the Post and ABC
instead presented stories that hyped up the Secret Service's
ostensible notions about the inauguration coming under
missile attack, the need for unprecedented high-security
measures, description of security checkpoints and so on.
Imani Henry, an IAC organizer who staffed the
mobilzation's offices in Washington, said he thought that
"this was a relentless, targeted attempt to frighten
Washington's large Black and Latina/o population away from
the Saturday demonstrations, much as Bush forces tried to
harass Black voters away from the polls in Florida.
"The story about our protest was finally aired on World
News Tonight the next evening, but the scare tactic was
already out there in the community from the newspapers and TV
the day before."
'We're not covering the protests'
On Jan. 20, C-SPAN covered one-and-a-half hours of the
inaugural parade without commentary. This allowed viewers to
clearly hear the thunderous cacophony of the dissenting
protesters on TV and on C-SPAN's Web site.
However, C-SPAN was the exception rather than the
rule.
During MSNBC's inaugural coverage, one commentator could
be heard saying, "We're not covering the protests, you know
that?" just before a commercial break. The comment was made
into a live microphone when the announcer apparently thought
he had gone off the air.
CNN and MSNBC repeatedly claimed they were unable to show
footage of the protests because demonstrators were "making
gestures too obscene to broadcast." Finally, CNN managed to
edit a five-minute report by correspondent Kate Snow that
aired several times after 10 p.m.
In a Jan. 22 story the Washington Post article admitted
that "demonstrators were evident on every block of the
1.6-mile [inaugural parade] route, and on some blocks on the
north side of Pennsylvania Avenue, they outnumbered other
parade-goers."
Due to the location of 12 of the 16 security checkpoints,
many more people were concentrated on the north side of
Pennsylvania Avenue than on the south. Yet, despite limited
access to the south side of the avenue, many anti-Bush
protesters mas sed there between 12th and 14th streets,
creating an overwhelming protestor majority among the crowd
on both sides.
Protesters observed several trucks transporting TV cameras
and news photographers along the parade route speed up as
they passed these blocks. That's why most TV viewers never
got a clear view of the crowds at Freedom Plaza.
In the days since the installation of the Bush
administration, much has been written about Bush's every move
during the inauguration.
The New York Times has published barely over 500 words
about the protests. A political feature story about TV
coverage of the inauguration in the Jan. 21 edition noted:
"You didn't have to be a cynic to see reality creeping in,
with comments on the rancorous post-election recount and the
divided Congress, and eventually with visible evidence of
furious protesters along the parade route. The anchors'
inability to stay inside their illusory bubble sent a strong
message to viewers: the country is living on a split
screen."
The New York Times article reduced the protests to a mere
symptom of divisions between Democrats and Republicans.
Independent media
pick up the banner
Where can someone go to find out what really happened
during the Jan. 20 counter-inaugural protest? How can one get
a sense of its significance?
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (fair.org), a national
media watchdog group, issued an action alert urging a
campaign to tell the New York Times to provide better
coverage of the protests. The alert sharply criticized
several recent Times articles that called the inauguration a
"vision of unity" and made no mention of angry protests.
The Independent Media Center (indymedia.org) has been a
repository of reportage, pictures, sound and video clips from
many demonstrations since Seattle protests against the World
Trade Organization in November-December 1999.
That Web site features excerpts of live radio broadcast on
Jan. 20, including a recording of organizer Larry Holmes
speaking to a fired-up crowd barricaded by police just north
of Freedom Plaza in the early hours of the protests: "They
don't want anybody who's got a sign that says 'Bush: free
Mumia!' or 'Bush equals President Death' or ... a big, black,
beautiful sign that just says 'NO!'
"They want us to be invisible. That's the real reason
behind all this security."
At this Web site, Jan Schmidt from the Arctic Avengers
tells an Indymedia reporter why she came all the way from
California to protest the "Bush-Cheney-Norton oil-industry
dream team that wants to drill in the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge."
There is also a short interview with Njeri Shakur of the
Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement, live coverage from
the scene at Navy Memorial Plaza where cops tried to beat up
several protesters, and excerpts from the 'shadow
inauguration' rally at the Supreme Court.
Also, many of the organizations that sponsored
demonstrations have regular meetings and maintain mailing
lists and E-mail lists, which are useful sources of
first-hand information.
Other independent working-class news is available from
Workers World newspaper (workers.org) and Peoples Video
Network (peoplesvideo.org). These media have helped rescue
the Jan. 20 demonstration from the big-media whiteout.
At a Jan. 23 meeting of IAC volunteers in New York, a
brief PVN video of the Freedom Plaza protest was
screened.
These independent media are vital to the growing movement.
Aside from the lack of objective coverage of progressive
causes by the major media, there is another factor to keep in
mind. Brian Becker of the IAC pointed out, "The same
corporations that own the media fear the rebirth of a mass
movement for social justice."
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email: ww@workers.org
Subscribe wwnews-subscribe@workersworld.net
Support independent news http://www.workers.org/orders/donate.php)
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