Emerald reporter Brad Schmidt did a superb job of reporting on the many differing voices from local media pertaining to the new journalist policies for the Eugene Police Department and should be commended (“EPD adopts new policies for journalists,” ODE, May 13).
However, the alternative media, especially in Eugene, hurt their cause by failing to actively participate in the process — in this case with the EPD’s Committee on Media Access Issues. The news media’s purpose is to inform the public, which is crucial to a democratic society. James Madison once wrote, “The right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free communication among the people thereon … has ever been justly deemed the only effectual guardian of every other right.” His words have sustained the test of time and, in my opinion, are among some of the best ever written about the relationship between the Fourth Estate and democracy.
But Cascadia Alive! videographer Tim Lewis and other alternative media outlets such as the Eugene Weekly and Eugene Indymedia accomplish nothing — in turn, failing their audience — while also reducing their organization’s credibility and accessibility to information by refusing to actively participate in said process.
“‘Nontraditional media haven’t participated in the discussion process because they feel doing so would validate it,’ said Tim Lewis, a freelance videographer for Cascadia Alive!, a local cable-access television show,” Schmidt writes in the article. “Lewis said the new policy won’t affect how he approaches his job and added that he won’t comply with a need for press credentials. If anything, he said, the policy will just control mainstream media.”
The new policies have little to do with attempting to control the media; rather, they aim to ensure that information is available — from a credible source — to the public.
Let me briefly illustrate my point by hitting on some of the benefits the alternative media establishment would have accomplished through their involvement:
First, they could have increased their access to information from the EPD (most likely leading to increased information availability from other government agencies) by making a good-faith effort to positively contribute to the policy process and raise any concerns or questions they had. Instead of being seen as non-legitimate, sensationalistic outlets always crying “foul,” they’d be seen as partners in informing the people, thereby increasing their ability to inform the people of both good deeds and wrongdoings.
Second, they could have increased their image, legitimacy and credibility by participating in the process. Had they put aside the punk anarchist attitudes for a moment and thought about it rationally, they’d have realized that to achieve their end desire — to broaden and increase their audience — they’d have been better off being involved.
Third, through involving themselves in the policy discussions, the alternative media, which typically have far less resources than mainstream media, could have benefited through the proposed press pool that would allow a limited number of media personnel to have access to dangerous or large-scale situations.
Media establishments such as these must look beyond agenda-driven ideology and focus less upon themselves and more upon their readers.
Sometimes you have to give a little. And in this case, the alternative media could have gotten a lot.
Aaron K. Breniman, a journalist and media critic
living in Portland, was community editor for the Emerald in 2001.