Mike Foster (Opinion Editor)
Before the nation knew all of the details, Ferguson, Missouri had already become a mess. Pictures showed peaceful protest, as well as violent riots and an organized flash raid of a QuickTrip. Photos of Michael Brown, highlighting his adolescent innocence, flowed through web servers, while the St. Louis County police department later shared video of Brown, allegedly, attacking a store clerk in what was apparently the incident that led up to his tragic death.
Depending on the reports we chose to hear, the story could be constructed to various angles. Whether immediate, persistent protests were appropriate, or if the justice system deserved its due diligence, the reactions of the public were predicated on the available information to them.
I sat on my hands, confused about the conflicting swarm of details coming from Ferguson, before I formulated my opinion. I had no clue whether or not it was an isolated incident where the victim did in fact physically assault an officer, or if he truly was another casualty as a result of unfair racial prejudice and disposition in the justice system.
But, whether we construct the evidence provided through media to favor one angle or the other, it’s still fundamentally important in a free society to be able to make those decisions—to have the information available to build your stance, and to freely and peacefully apply your reaction to public discourse with the intent to solve problems.
That’s why the blatant hand-cuffing of the free press by police became my opportunity to join the conversation with my voice. As a student concentrating in Journalism and Citizen Media here at KSU, the incident in Ferguson has become an important display of the reality that public departments aren’t afraid to suppress the press. But, at the same time, citizen journalism has resisted that oppression. The conflict in Ferguson has proven that many of the big-government, burning-constitution scare tactics heeded by right-wingers for years is, in fact, kinetic. Public departments are making egregious power plays and ignoring the Constitution completely.
On Aug. 17, Wesley Lowery of The Washington Post and Ryan Reilly of The Huffington Post were physically assaulted by officers for not leaving a McDonalds, in which they were working in covering the Brown shooting, after police entered and shut down the private business. They were arrested, detained, and then released by police without any documentation or police report. The police committed this act without the intuition that the journalists would Tweet out the injustice as soon as they were let go.
That night, Al Jazeera America’s television crew was attacked with rubber bullets and tear gas after standing their ground to show images of the violent police presence that had taken to the Ferguson streets with tanks, rifles and other militarized accessories.
These tactics, along with a questionable no-fly ordinance, even though livestream video proved the sound of what was assumed to be police helicopters, were clear attempts to restrict free coverage of the incidents happening in the town.
Thankfully, cell phone video and live-Tweeting kept the nation informed on many of the incidents happening, while national networks struggled throughout the week after the incident to provide comprehensive coverage from ground zero.
Citizen journalism prevailed over traditional journalism in getting information to the people. While the police force tried its best to censor the scene, it ultimately failed. What it brought in guns, it couldn’t bring in the tech savvy and adaptivity.
Now many are taking notice of how useful tablet and device media can be. According to an Aug. 18 report in the Wall Street Journal, the use of police force in Rialto, Calif. Declined 60 percent in one year after the implementation of body cameras, required to be worn by all on-duty officers.
Evidently, more universal use of body cameras would be expensive (I fail to see how, in the future, considering the streamlining of technology). But, I’d be much more receptive to the federal government supplying common sense technology to police departments, rather than sending communities tanks and rifles.
Journalism students here should take these events and possibilities seriously. While information is power, militarized oppression of communities and the First Amendment is tyrannical.
