Whatever Happened to Fear of the Press? Reflections inspired when reporters were escorted out of a Mitt Romney Q and A
The recent dust-up over tossing reporters out of a Mitt Romney event at the Newseum was ironic enough on its own. But it also adds to an expanding pattern that makes you think nobody’s very afraid of the press anymore.
Once, standard advice warned, “Don’t pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel.”
People did challenge journalists, of course, but they often regretted doing it. Today the engagements seem more common and the consequences less scary. Politicians, military, police, security agents and others seem almost eager to have their way with press members.
Earlier this year, for example, the “press freedom index” of Reporters Without Borders dropped the United States 27 places, to 47th in the world, based largely on “the many arrests of journalists covering Occupy Wall Street protests.”
Partly all this is a reaction to 9/11. Partly it’s a consequence of mainstream media’s decline in status―and therefore fearsomeness.
And some of it is deserved. Not that long ago, we worried that concentration was making big media unaccountable.