As protests continue throughout the U.S. and around the globe, journalists covering those events often find themselves in peril. According to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker and the Committee to Protect Journalists, members of the media are facing increasing violence.
“This is a moment when we ought to standup and be counted and say it’s not okay to attack the press,” according to Professor John Affleck, the Knight Chair in Sports Journalism and Society at Penn State university. “It’s one of the fundamental principles of our democratic society is that the press has to be free and unfettered. That doesn’t mean you have to like it, but you have to tolerate it telling you truthful information.”
Affleck recently penned letter signed by 23 fellow Knight Chairs from around the nation, addressing the situation, which involves hundreds of incidents.
“And these are pretty serious things, including blinding of a journalist, a videographer; and pretty severe beatings of the journalists at the hands of either law enforcement, or in a fewer number of cases, protestors.”
Affleck wants those committing attacks to face consequences.
“In the letter myself and my colleagues argue for people who have carried out attacks on journalists to be held to account. In my head I had the idea of prosecution.”
The Knight Foundation supports journalism. Those signing the letter include chairs from Duke, Berkeley, Columbia and UGA.
To view letter, visitDeWitt Wallace Center for Media & Democracy.
