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December 5-11, 2002 city beat Dissent Decree
Protesters complain they get short shrift in media. There is a movement taking shape around the country, not so’s you’d notice. Hundreds of thousands of people have joined marches, rallies and vigils to protest the impending war with Iraq, but protest organizers say that while the number of protesters is increasing by leaps and bounds, for the most part the mainstream media either downplays the marches, or doesn’t cover them at all. Case in point: Saturday before last, an estimated 3,000 protesters gathered at Philadelphia City Hall and marched to the Liberty Bell, voicing their opposition to what they see as an inevitable U.S. invasion of Iraq. A quick search of NewsLibrary reveals exactly one article about the protest, a piece in the Nov. 24 edition of The Philadelphia Inquirer. Organizers complain that while a few media representatives showed up, most either decided the story wasn't worth running, or ran the story and got it wrong. "Channel 6 reported that there were 200 people there," says protest organizer Robert Smith, of the Brandywine Peace Community. "Now maybe they gave the number from very early in the day, when there may have been 200, but to say that there were 200 people at a rally where at least 3,000 people showed up is strange, don't you think?" Smith says he doesn't blame the media, he blames the Bush administration. "It goes without saying that the media is sucked into the administration rhetoric," Smith explains. "When George Bush went on television and said, ŒYou're either for us or you're against us,' he made it crystal clear. Anti-war sentiments have been successfully categorized by the administration as anti-American, and the media seems to have bought into that theory. It begins with the assumption that since Bush is popular, therefore anyone in opposition to his policies must be unpopular or even irrelevant, and therefore, not worth the coverage. The truth is, it's easier to write red, white and blue rah-rah stories than it is to offer thoughtful critical analysis. I hate to say it, but the anti-war protests probably won't become a real story until the bombs start falling." Smith says that the lack of coverage is especially troubling given that the number of people participating in anti-war protest marches and rallies locally and nationwide are far exceeding the expectations of even the event organizers. This observation is seconded by an unlikely source -- the Philadelphia Police Department. The Civil Affairs unit is responsible for monitoring and tracking protests and protesters in Philadelphia, acting as liaison between the event organizers and city officials. Captain William Fisher is head of the Civil Affairs unit, and has been equally praised by protest organizers, cops and community leaders for his fairness, tolerant attitude and his willingness to go the extra mile to ensure that protests don't get out of hand. "When we got to City Hall, the crowd was about 1,000," Fisher said of the protest on Nov. 23. "I went to the men's room, and by the time I got back, that number had doubled. During the march, the front of the crowd was at 11th and Market before the back of the crowd had left City Hall. By the time we got to the Liberty Bell, there were at least 3,000 people. I spoke to the organizers, and even they were taken aback by the sheer numbers of people who had joined. Before the march, they estimated 500 to 1,000." Fisher says that while media coverage of anti-war protests is probably not sufficient to satisfy protest organizers, there is some coverage. More importantly, he opines, the coverage will increase as the numbers of protests increase. And the numbers will increase, he predicts. "If anti-war protests were selling stock, I'd buy it," Fisher laughs. "The movement is growing fast -- faster than any of us could have predicted." Philadelphia Daily News editor Zack Stalberg admits that his paper hasn't really done anything on the anti-war movement yet, and in particular the Nov. 23 protest rally, but says there's a very good reason for that. "Unfortunately, the march was on a Saturday, and we have no Sunday paper," Stalberg says. "Sometimes logistics get in the way of news coverage, but rest assured that we are interested in this issue, and plan to address it. If they'd move their protests to Sundays, we'll be all over it," he laughs. Stalberg actually agrees with Robert Smith and the other organizers that press coverage is lacking on the anti-war front, and says that Smith is right on the money with his assertion that the protests may not make the front pages nationally until the body count starts to mount. "My personal reaction is that right now, it [the war] doesn't seem quite real to most Americans. It's hard to imagine a war preceded by all the talk and threats coming out of the Bush administration," Stalberg says. "Mr. Smith is probably right. When the bombs start dropping, and soldiers start coming home in body bags, then people will start to focus on the human toll, and the anti-war demonstrators will get a lot more attention." As for the Daily News, Stalberg says that his paper has consistently been anti-Bush and wary of a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, and will devote more coverage to the issue as time goes on. Peter Lems, program assistant for the Iraq Peacebuilding Program of the American Friends Service Committee, says that the biggest challenge for anti-war protest organizers is to combat the assertion that anti-war sentiments are anti-American by nature. "Acceptable discussion of dissent has been narrowed, to say the least," Lems says. "We must first challenge the notion that opposition to the war is unpatriotic. It seems clear to me that the number of people questioning the war outnumber the supporters at this point. It is my belief that as the anti-war demonstrations gain momentum, the media will follow." 
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