Journal of the Capital Gazette EB Furgurson III looks at crosses representing his five colleagues in an improvised memorial on the places in front of the building housing The Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis, Md., July 1, 2018. (Photo: Jose Luis Magana, AP) [19659006] A shootout that killed five people in Capital Gazette newspaper on June 28 last is only the latest in a series of attacks that have drawn the attention of the nation
This time the targets were different: no d & # 39; # 39; schoolchildren or moviegoers, but reporters.
This is the deadliest assault against journalists in the United States since the September 11 attacks, which killed an independent photographer and six broadcast engineers, and highlights the growing fear that journalism becomes more dangerous. In conflict zones or authoritarian countries has always been risky, the deaths of journalists in the United States have been, until now, rare. But the shooting of the Gazette de la Capitale catapulted the United States to the third rank of the most dangerous countries for journalists, behind Syria and Afghanistan according to the Committee for the Protection of Journalists .
This rise coincides with an increase in public attacks against the press, many of which come from President Donald Trump, who described the media as "enemies of the people." Trump often defames the media such as The New York Times and CNN and tweets insults at individual journalists, fueling an increase in animosity towards reporters.
According to a report published in April by Reporters Without Borders, a worldwide group defending freedom of expression, "democratically elected leaders no longer consider the media as an essential element of democracy but as an adversary whose they openly show aversion. A media enthusiast, Trump called journalists "enemies of the people," a term formerly used by Joseph Stalin.
For more information: In an editorial of the Bloodstained Capital Gazette, the mission continues
For more information: The victims of the 'Capital Gazette & # 39; were beloved parents, friends
In the case of the Capital Gazette, the shooter rivalry with the newspaper that preceded the Trump administration. Courtney Radsch, the advocacy director for the Committee to Protect Journalists, warned against confusion between the two.
"We must be careful to link this (shooting) to the environment and wider change in the dangerous rhetoric coming from the high political function," she said.
But for some, the shooting was a tragic manifestation of the growth of vitriol towards journalists and a harbinger that this could worsen.
"We will never know if, if the public discourse of our nation had not become so poisonous, this man would have felt that he could simply act with impunity," said Lucy Dalglish, Dean from the School of Journalism of the University of Maryland. Rob Hiaasen, victim of the Capital Gazette, was a speaker. "But I can not help but think that the wickedness of the summit did not help."
Earlier attacks against journalists, although less lethal, also illustrated the fact that media hatred can turn into violence.
The Committee to Protect Journalists reports that 11 journalists – including the five people killed in the Capital Gazette – have been killed at work since the committee began to draw up a table of deaths in 1992.
them: Robert Stevens, editor of the photo at the tabloid The Sun, died of anthrax inhalation in 2001, the same strain of anthrax that had been mailed to other reporters . And Chauncey Bailey, editor of the Oakland Post who was killed in retaliation for covering the financial ties of a local bakery known for its community activism in 2007.
To learn more: Work at the Capital Gazette. This shot did not hit the house he was at home.
For more information: The Capital Gazette shooter constantly harassed journalists on Twitter. Why was not he arrested?
More recently, Alison Parker, a journalist for local channel WDBJ7, and Adam Ward, a cameraman, were killed at a live broadcast in Smith Mountain Lake, Virginia in 2015. "The" The abuser had been fired two years earlier, in 2013, and had a history of workplace conflict allegedly fueled by racial grievances.
Parker's father, Andy Parker, said he immediately thought about his daughter when he heard about the shooting in Annapolis.
"The memory of Alison's murder just fell," he said. "The mass shootings are terrible, but this one hit me more than anything."
The Capital Gazette shootout highlights another disturbing trend, say the experts: Despite Trump's frequent attacks on national media, local media risk.
"It's the journalists who cover their community, who can be known to people in the community, who are in the front line," Radsch said. She added that the vast majority of journalists killed since 1992 were working for local media outlets.
"Small media in small communities provide local news, pure and simple," said Parker. "The New York Times is not going to cover that sort of thing, the Washington Post is not going to cover that sort of thing."
Following the shooting, newsrooms in the country strengthened their security.
If the Capital Gazette's shooting is a harbinger of a new era when local media organizations face serious security threats as well as debilitating financial conflicts, the consequences could to be disastrous, said Dalglish.
"If they can not do their job by informing their community, then you will not know why your taxes are going up, you will not know about the local high school football team, you do not know. I'm not sure who is running in the local elections, "she said. "They are a bit like your first responders who do it because they think it's important because they like it."
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