Letter From Athens: Greek Riots and the News Media in the Age of Twitter

Oh really. Like the news from Iraq that we never heard. People invent better mouse traps for one reason only. The old ones weren't good enough. There was a time when journalism in this country was something to be proud of. Now it's nothing more than entertainment. PBS being the exception. The internet has brought the world together in a way that we couldn't imagine. Our recent election turned out to be a historic event. The internet was a huge ingredient and no thanks to the news casters. It must be daunting to realize that millions of people out there have access to each other. Everything I learned about the Iraq War I learned from Iraqi bloggers and online newspapers. Our own TV coverage was pathetic. A bunch of old retired generals telling us how well everything was going. That's not news, it lying to the public for which they were paid. A private citizen
sharing information is not likely to lie. For one thing, it's easy to get caught and then look foolish. The real news is what's important to people and what they choose to talk about, not what sells shampoo or cars. I think the people have made their choice. Thanks, ANNA

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Yup, we oughtta listen to the old pro's tellenus whazzup. Sure thing, pal. None of the élite I know will even tolerate mention of the 911 Truth Scholars, much less listen to the facts outlined by them and the host of others. I know teachers of history who can't leave their safe base of scholarship to watch a dvd showing the downfall of building 7. What's the use of all that knowledge when, in the thick of things in the primordial world where we all have to act, that urge to know just melts out in a short-winded wheeze? Where were the pros when we needed them? Bootlicking, Brown nosing, Boosting the Iraqi invasion débacle, that's where. We've "moved on." You twits believe that the writers for the Daily Kos, the Huffington Post, Alternet, Cooperative Research, Brad DeLong, Glenn Greenwald can't give us context? They give us more for our money than you pros and pundits ever did, because you were always protecting your ass. You think I wanna read that criminal Billy Kristol in the NYT? Or Judith Miller? Ever learn the meaning of the word "discredited?"

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If you’re going to use the example of young people rioting in Greece, you might want to take your own advice and provide a short analysis of the circumstances.

The mainstream media, which reported on the riots in a manner similar to your own, might garner more respect and readership if we didn’t feel compelled to go online and discover that Greece has the highest youth unemployment rate in the EU, at nearly 30%. We would also learn that Greeks perceive education as a vehicle for social and economic advancement and that while expensive private schools thrive, affordable public education is in a shambles. Police brutality is a common response to understandable social unrest. Government corruption is pervasive. Citizens hold public servants in the lowest esteem, with police officers being particularly culpable.

This article speaks only of young peoples’ “rage” and fires set by “rioters and looters” without even briefly reflecting on motives. Greece has been in social, economic, and political turmoil for some time now and young people bear the brunt; many are without hope. Readers deserve to know this before dismissing those involved as a thoughtless mob, ignorant of the “facts.” Historically, people don’t lightly take to the streets, especially in countries notorious for state violence. It would help us also to know that neo-fascists are sometimes known to enter the fray on the side of the police.

A sense of our own history is not amiss here. Consider the Boston Massacre with its negligible fatalities and its momentous repercussions.

BTW, I'd like to know how a bullet "fired into the air" managed to dent something and ricochet with deadly force into to the body of a fifteen year old.

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It's a lot more difficult these days to separate the truth from the lies and errors. In the old days, like my teen-age years in the 1950's, all we got were the lies of the ruling-class media, so life was a lot easier.

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Hi, Andrew --

I was very puzzled by your post about the riots in Greece. I was in Greece at the very conference you were at, and believe that you are very wrong in your assertions.

And yes, I did go out at night, as did various others, interviewing peaceful demonstrators, rock-throwing youngsters, shop keepers, and police and getting doused in tear gas. Why did you stay in the hotel? It was just a short walk from where the city was burning.

There was continuous coverage on all Greek television stations, radio, and in the papers, the BBC and CNN had coverage, there were numerous people taking photos, twittering in English, Greek, and other languages. There was a tag - #griots, and you can see lots of Quik video — in addition to the all-night news coverage on every channel, roundtable discussions, and commentary from activists, politicians, and researchers in Greece.

The night I was out — the second night of the riots, there were in some streets more journalists than demonstrators, from Reuters, CNN, and the BBC, to name just a few, and of course numerous Greek outlets and stations.

I am not sure what you mean when you say: “What Athens confirmed for me, at least, is that professional front line reporters may very well be on the way to being redundant in a world where, according to Reuters Director of News Media Development, Chris Cramer, “Every key event going forward will be covered by members of the public, and not by traditional journalists.”

You clearly did not bother to go down the street so your impressions, from inside the hotel room, are just simply false. There were plenty traditional journalists on every corner. (Though had you turned on the TV while stuck in your you'd seen the night-long MSM coverage - with plenty of reporters in the streets.)

What I saw in the streets all night was a mix of journalists from all over the world, people like me watching, blogging, twittering, and taking photos, and other people watching in disbelief what was happening there. There was, very quickly, a discussion about why this was happening — a dialogue about the disenchantment of Greek youth, high unemployment, the mistrust in and corruption of the right-wing government, and how resentments and disillusionment could boil over, as well as the conduct of the police, and the orders to the police to refrain from rounding up some of the more violent youth roaming the streets, burning and looting.

This is not to say that your main point is not a valid one: “It is a dangerous world, indeed, when citizen reporters are completely trusted, both by the media institutions that incorporate them and by the audience who consume that information. The role of the mature news organization, one should think, is to filter real news from pseudo news, rather than treating all content as equal.”

Context, background, and thoughtful discussion — as well as distinguishing fact from rumor and innuendo from research — are important by all who are swept up in an event. But you are getting it wrong if you think that Athens, Greece was that example.

You would have seen that had you bothered to go outside.

Sincerely,

Katrin Verclas

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In his piece "Letter From Athens: Greek Riots and the News Media in the Age of Twitter," Andrew Lam of New America Media writes: "The spontaneous protests and riots were organized largely by young people, who text-messaged and phoned each other, and who used social networks such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter." It sounds like there was significant planning, organization and choreography involved.

If these rioters were using text-messaging, telephones and "social networks" such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, how could these events have been both "spontaneous" and "organized?" Isn't that a contradiction in terms?

So, were the riots "spontaneous" or "organized?" Wasn't all this violent and low-tech street theater?

Chris Frazier

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First of all, I believe that many of the conclusions that you come to concerning the role of the internet in reporting news are perfectly valid.

As a blogger myself and contributer to sites such as Ireport and Nowpublic I have come to the conclusion that the skills that professional journalist possess are vital in being credible. I, also feel that the loss of media jobs is a dangerous trend which weakens society.

However, I believe that the Greek examples you use to support your case are flawed. They fail to take into account much of the cultural, political and historical background to the events in Greece.

For example you say that the police officer charged with the shooting was condemned in the court of public opinion before he had the chance to defend himself in court.

This is of course true but it also ignores the fact that there have been a long, inglorious history of succh police related killings which have not resulted in a single officer going to jail.

In addition mainstream media interviewd at least half a dozen eye witnesses to the killing who directly contridicted the officer's account of the incident. As did video taken at the time of the killing.

In contrast with many media outlets who focused almost exclusively on the violent actions of perhaps 5% of the protesters, bloggers and other have given the views of the majority of people taking part in demos. They have also documented the numerous abuses of power by the police ansd cases where supposed "anarchist rioters" have been working closely with the police.

Here is video I took during the protests that confirms what till then I believed was just another conspiracy theory.

Youtube

I have been on the streets following events for the last two weeks and so I can see that much of coverage on the blogs etc has been of a greater cailibre than traditional media sources.

Teacher Dude

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I'm not sure if professional journalism has existed on any significant scale for as long as I or my parents have even been alive. Sure, people with professions who call themselves journalists. But these people have all been darlings of the state and big business for as long as anyone living today could care to remember. They're not real journalists, not in the way that I would conceive of one. Face it, they're a joke. And a disgrace to any idea of responsible information transmission whatsoever. News reporting is superficial, sensationalistic, a circus. And many people know that, on some fundamental level. And it's ridiculous to imply that any of the talking heads on television, or anyone attending your conference, for that matter, are capable of the kind of sincere, thoughtful, sustained or nuanced analysis that a lot of people in this world are truly hungry for. There are hundreds of scholars out there who are far more capable of providing a solid analysis of contemporary events than anyone of that ilk (though there's something to be said for the role that intellectuals play in shoring up the positions of the powers that be - I'm speaking more about scholars of the more renegade sort, here).

Citizen-based media has its flaws that need to be worked out, but it's being created because people recognize the need for more decentralized forms of media-sharing that is at least more self-conscious of its own bias, rather than attemping to claim an objectivity that simply doesn't exist the way that members of the corporate media world do.

As for the cop's supposed innocence. Did it not occur to you that the people who have been rioting fundamentally hate cops and everything they stand for? Did it not occur to you that regardless of whether or not this particular cop "meant" to kill this particular youth, that this was but one instance in the daily occurence of police brutality in just about every country on this planet? I think you make a mistake when you assume that people rioting don't have any systemic analysis. I'm sure many perceive the institution of the police as inherently corrupt and created to control people and protect the property of the wealthy. Police rape, brutalize and murder people every day with impunity. They're a symbol of tyranny for many. And sometimes it just doesn't take much to set people off.

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...is to INVESTIGATE.

Think about it. We can get raw footage from whoever is there and has a video camera. We can get context from any blogger with an understanding of his or her country's history. (Most bloggers, in fact, do commentary rather than actual reporting.) But it takes time, persistence, skill and often money to do real investigative reporting. Too bad that's the first part of a news organization's budget to get cut.

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