Anatoly I. Policastro, a 10th-grade home-schooled student in Washington, D.C., was the local winner of this year’s SPJ high school essay contest. The topic was: Why is it important that we have news media that are independent of the government? Anatoly wrote:
Freedom of the Press = Freedom for the People
As America enters an election year, the importance of the Freedom of the Press cannot be overemphasized. Reporting of primary elections and presidential campaigns can sway the opinions of many if the reporting is undertaken in a way to persuade the population to move in a certain direction. This highlights the importance of our First Amendment Constitutional Freedom of the Press for not just this year, but everyday and in every way, because freedom of the press equals freedom for the people.
I come from a country where freedom of the press was not a given, which helps to draw certain comparisons. Though in Russia’s Constitution freedom of the press is guaranteed, in real practice journalists face “contract killings, attacks, intimidation, frivolous legal challenges, threats of physical violence, arson and burglaries.”1 To make matters worse, during the years 1993-2009, 300 journalists who tended to write in any critically honest manner ended up dead or simply disappeared in Russia, with the International News Safety Institute claiming the number over the past ten years to have increased to over 1,000. Police do not actively pursue the perpetrators, sending an unspoken warning message to those who speak or write their conscience as 90% of these murderers are never prosecuted.2
Because members of the press feel unable to be totally transparent and free, the general populace does not feel free, as well. They sense the withholding of information through traditional media channels often owned by the state and thus, are developing new sources of information gathering and dissemination.
The Internet played a large role in organizing the largest anti-government protect in Russia in the past two decades of semi-freedom. The December 10th, 2011, rally followed amidst accusations of ballot-stuffing in December 4th’s Parliamentary elections and led to requests by the FSB (former KGB) to block opposition groups from using Vkontakte, Russia’s equivalent of Facebook. This came as no surprise since another senior FSB official said as early as April 2011, during the Arab spring movement, that without controls, Gmail, Hotmail, and Skype posed a threat to Russian national security, as well.3
Russia may serve as a cautionary model for America’s own slipping freedom of the press. Both nations face elections this year, with special interest groups keen on promoting their candidate to become president. What was the agenda behind the incorrect winners being announced in two out of the first five Republican primary elections? Was it poor verification of information being fed to reporters by the GOP, or was it directed by undue influence from one candidate’s campaign who repeatedly appeared to benefit from the misinformation, or was it led by “the four corporations that own all of America’s news media outlets”?4
It is only through vigilance and verified-fact reporting, perhaps through outside watchdog groups, that America’s press will continue to stay independent, accountable, and free from government and any other type of manipulation.
1Paul Klebnikov, An American Journalist is Murdered in Moscow, http://archive.pressthink.org/2004/07/23/kleb_shot.html (July 23, 2004).
2The International Federation of Journalists, Partial Justice: An inquiry into the deaths of journalists in Russia, http://www.ifji.org/assets/docs/104/092/b4ec068-fe7585c.pdf, (Brussels, Belgium, 2010).
3Reuters, Russian security chief calls for regulated Internet, http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/12/14/9443673-russian-security-chief-calls-for-regulated-internet. (December 14, 2011).
4Mark Wachtler, Paul camp cries fraud over Nevada Caucus results, http://www.examiner.com/independent-in-national/paul-camp-cries-fraud-over-nevada-caucus-results, (February 5, 2012).