Events spotlight media-social justice, safely covering protests
While the world may have almost come to a stop, peace journalism hasn’t, as evidenced by the two events I spoke at this week. 

The first, on Wednesday, was a Zoom presentation to kick off the annual Greater Kansas City Peacebuilding Conference. I discussed “Media Narratives: Impeding Social Justice.” I led off with a discussion about the divergent partisan narratives of the Black Lives Matter protests (see chart), and went on to explain how this coverage has impeded social justice by inaccurately tarring protesters with a “violent” label and “stigmatizing protesters as deviant and depicting protests as violent.”  Also, such coverage is episodic, and doesn’t generate “substantive information about the event’s background or the grievances or agendas of the movement behind the protest.” (See-- https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1940161219853517 .) 

Several of the audience questions dealt with how to better inform oneself. This led me, inevitably, into endorsing media literacy. I urged the audience to break out of their ideological news bubbles, and to seek out news that contradicts their worldview. In a nutshell, liberals should watch Hannity and read the Wall St. Journal, and conservatives should read the Washington Post and watch Rachel Maddow. 

The next event in the Greater Kansas City Peacebuilding Conference is a discussion by journalist/activist Lewis Diuguid titled, “Disinformation, Civil Rights Protests, and Social Justice” at 1pm CST on September 21, the international day of peace. To register or read more about the conference, see https://www.jccc.edu/conferences/peacebuilding/ . 

KC BLM protests, by Carlos Moreno-KCUR

My second event on Thursday, sponsored by the International Relations Council, was a Zoom forum on the safety of journalists. I began by giving a brief overview of challenges to reporters posed by both Covid 19 and covering the Black Lives Matter protests. Then, I was joined by KCUR multimedia journalists Carlos Moreno, who detailed his experiences covering the BLM protests in Kansas City.  I talked about threats to press freedom around the world related to Covid, then presented about the arrests and harassment journalists have faced covering the BLM protests. Moreno shared his photos of the protests taken in Kansas City, along with his general impression about his safety. He said that both protesters and police treated him well, and that with the exception of one small incident, he never felt threatened.

We also discussed the Committee to Protect Journalists tips on safely covering protests that include wearing protective gear and utilizing situational awareness.