Emily Bell writes for The Guardian:
‘[…] Reporters languishing in jail in Egypt, cartoonists shot in France, Saudi Arabian bloggers imprisoned for filming beheadings. The figure for officially imprisoned journalists has gone up from 80 around the world in 2000 to 221 last year according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), and the number killed was 69 professional journalists, 11 media assistants and 19 activists and citizen journalists.
These might seem like relatively small numbers when taken in the context of global conflict, but when one considers that 30 years ago identifying oneself as press was a way of making one safer, then it is understandable that as a profession we are both shocked by and unprepared for our own vulnerability.
The power of information and news is magnified greatly by the ubiquity of digital media. Smashing a press is relatively easy compared to deleting an image from a social media website. As it has become harder to censor outlets, and as the attention focused on stories and individual journalists has grown, then so has the sport of intimidation, violence and imprisonment.’
- The Worldwide Crackdown On Journalism
- The war on leaks has gone way too far when journalists’ emails are under surveillance
- “Circus of Hypocrisy”: Jeremy Scahill on How World Leaders at Paris March Oppose Press Freedom
- These ‘staunch defenders’ of the free press are attending today’s solidarity rally in Paris
- 21st-century censorship: Governments around the world are using stealthy strategies to manipulate the media
- Internet Freedom: The Rest of the World Gradually Becoming More Like China
- Global Chilling: The Impact of Mass Surveillance on International Writers
- Politicians Only Love Journalists When They’re Dead
- Journalists killed around the world since 1992
- 406 Journalists Killed In Iraq Since 2003
- Murdered journalists: 90% of killers get away with it but who are the victims?
- The best and worst countries for journalists
- Jeremy Scahill and The War on Journalism
- The rise of the reader: Are we in a new golden age of journalism?
Filed under: Free Speech, Mainstream Media, Surveillance, War On Terror
