The arrest last week of Journal Sentinel photographer Kristyna Wentz-Graaf prompted some to wonder if the paper was being targeted in the aftermath of its controversial series on police. But a person who saw a video of the incident – which occurred during an Occupy Milwaukee demonstration – tells Pressroom Buzz that almost certainly was not the case. The arresting officers appeared to target anyone in the protest march who ventured off the sidewalk and into the street, says this observer, who reports the arrested were released without charges.
The Milwaukee Press Club [PDF] and state [PDF] and national [PDF] press photographers’ groups have written to Chief Ed Flynn and the city’s Police and Fire Commission in protest.
Even if the paper wasn’t targeted, the incident reinforces the sense that Milwaukee police aren’t paying much deference to working journalists, as illustrated by the dust-up in September when a WITI Channel 6 video journalist was arrested after he challenged a police order to move back from a police line at a fire, even as bystanders in the same area were ignored.
Flynn has staunchly defended his officers’ conduct in the latest incident, as he did in the Channel 6 one. WISN-TV Channel 12 had this roundup on the mess last week.
Two points to note. First, Mayor Tom Barrett, who remains strongly supportive of Flynn, did speak up for the newspaper in this instance. Second, as one observer pointed out to me this week, it wouldn’t be surprising if Flynn has chosen to stand by his cops publicly – but talk to them much tougher in private.
Word is that news media managers and Flynn are supposed to meet this week to air out the issue.
In other media news and commentary…
At-large Milwaukee Public School Board member Terry Falk had this little item recently tweaking the Journal Sentinel on perennial speculation about whether Supt. Gregory Thornton is on the way out of town. (No, he isn’t, say board members I’ve heard from.)
NPR is embroiled in another controversy about personnel, politics and political opinions. Lisa Simeone, who hosts The World of Opera and until recently hosted Soundprint, was working as a volunteer spokeswoman for an ongoing Washington, D.C., anti-war protest. Simeone is a freelancer, not on NPR’s staff, but after the revelation of her extra-curricular volunteer work, Soundprint (which is not produced by NPR) fired her while NPR stopped distributing World of Opera.
Subsequently, Caitlin Curran, a freelance web producer, was dismissed from NPR’s New York station for holding up a protest sign at an OWS demonstration. She tells her story to Gawker.
NPR’s dropping of Simeone’s opera show strikes many as over the top while the Curran firing is for some a closer question. NPR’s own media show, On the Media, has several items on the issues these stories raise.
Before these latest developments, Jack Shafer wrote a column for Reuters criticizing the rigid way mainstream journalism outlets police the opinions of their journalists. Recently he took part in a chat at the Poynter Institute on the same subject. Some money quotes from the chat:
I’d say that a journalist who is transparent about his views sometimes has to work harder to make an argument than the one who pretends to have no opinions…
It makes no sense to me to force good reporters and editors to pretend they’re without opinion. Why do people want these journalists to live a lie! Please let them come out of the closet. They won’t hurt you…
Again, I think the best journalists can do is rely on an objective method to their work–be honest, be fair, not bury inconvenient arguments, and be prepared to change their minds. We don’t expect scientists to be “unbiased,” we merely expect them to be honest in their pursuit of scientific truth. I want us to apply the same standard to journalists.
Shafer, by the way, attributes the “objective method” construct to Tom Rosenstiel and Bill Kovach in their 2001 book, The Elements of Journalism.
(Full disclosure: As a freelancer, I have done writing and editing on behalf of various nonprofit groups, some of them working on issues that relate to important topics in the news. I’ve always disclosed to editors any work that might present an appearance of conflict, and, where relevant, to readers.)
In another Gawker story, writer Hamilton Nolan exposes – well his headline says it best: “The Shady Marketing Scheme That’s Buying Off Your Favorite Bloggers.”
Richard Prince dishes up the story of a hapless Minneapolis investigative team who thought a New York Chinatown grocery store was selling dog meat when it was, um, selling duck.
And finally… The new issue of Columbia Journalism Review celebrates 50 years of the publication’s press criticism. If you care about the media, buy a copy and read it.
Comment below, or write Pressroom at pressroom@milwaukeemagazine.com.
Follow Pressroom on Facebook or on Twitter.
