[Fwd: Re: [diggers350] Re: normal investigative journalism?]
David Heller (Friends of the Earth)
david at motherearth.org
Mon May 5 19:03:42 BST 2008
ho hum,
seems like the same old arguments are bound to keep repeating
themselves. Even back in the "good old days" of the Diggers 350
(St.Georges Hill) squat in 1999 there were arguments about how far we
should go in courting the mainstream media, how critical we should be of
letting them set the agenda, and the position of people who spoke for
(or on behalf of) the movement.
Of course, the context changes, but the tension will always be there.
Even when you have a seemingly watertight media strategy, and people
willing to speak to the press, something like this undercover report can
throw people off track, and put you on the defensive.
When some of us in Belgium launched FreeLiving Inc. (www.freeliving.be)
posing as a new form of "estate agent" renting shitty properties to
asylum seekers, we had a whole media strategy planned for how we would
build up the hoax and then finally make a spectacular "reveal".
A hard-working journalist worked out who was behind this stunt after a
few hours.
The result? panic on our part, but a much greater impact as we were able
to ride on the publicity that his report generated.
In fact, the exposé itself became the story.
But that was only possible as we were willing to continue a critical
engagement with the mainstream media even as one of "them" was doing his
best to undermine our action.
George Monbiot's guide to using the media remains a good source of tips
and advice:
http://www.fraw.org.uk/gs/handbook/media.htm
but maybe I'm just preaching to the converted?
david
Friends of the Earth vzw
K. Maria Hendrikaplein 5
9000 Gent
België
tel: 09 242 87 52
gsm: 0472 342 463
david at motherearth.org
www.moederaarde.be
---
"The Big Ask": Een vraag voor jaarlijkse emissiereducties in Europa
www.thebigask.be
ben at riseup.net wrote:
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Subject:
> Re: [diggers350] Re: normal investigative journalism?
> From:
> ben <ben at riseup.net>
> Date:
> Mon, 5 May 2008 16:48:21 +0100
> To:
> "Massimo A. Allamandola" <suburbanstudio at runbox.com>
>
> To:
> "Massimo A. Allamandola" <suburbanstudio at runbox.com>
> CC:
> diggers350 at yahoogroups.com, smell.the.media at gmail.com
>
>
> Personally, and this is highly unusual, I think I kind of agree with
> Tony (assuming I am interpreting what he wrote as he intended). The
> squatters estate agents was and is as much a stunt as a form of direct
> action and as part of the days of action for squats and autonomous
> spaces it would have made sense to have considered and planned how to
> make use of any mainstream media attention that came our way.
>
> The last decade or more has seen activist distrust of the media at an
> all time high and while I don't disagree with that distrust I am
> constantly frustrated by the withdrawal of engagement with the
> mainstream media that follows that point of view. As much as I think
> we should be developing our own media that doesn't mean we should
> ignore the opportunities offered by the established media.
>
> There was a time when any action worth the name had at least one
> person doing media. Usually that would be somebody at home or work
> ready to send out the press released the moment they got the word that
> it was going down and somebody on the ground primed to do interviews
> when the press arrived. Add to that a tame photographer and perhaps a
> video activist or two able to provide TV news with footage.
>
> Since the inception of indymedia it appears many activists are content
> with having perhaps 8,000 people read a badly written report of what
> the police did in response to their action and perhaps post a dozen
> badly composed and almost identical photos of some cops or people
> holding banners. That's not media, that's a blog and a bad one at
> that.
>
> I've long given up trying to get consensus on media strategy within
> collective projects so I am as much to blame as anyone for the lack of
> thought and discussion given to the subject. However I think that
> things have looked up a bit in the form of the climate camp media
> group that shows that grassroots direct action groups and collective
> processes can still formulate and enact a positive media policy.
>
>
>
> Ben
>
>
>
> 2008/5/5 Massimo A. Allamandola <suburbanstudio at runbox.com>:
>
>> As I can talk only in "personal capacity" I hope a collective answer of this
>> emails
>> could bring you more informations...(hopefully over the next few days)
>>
>> After the article of the "Daily-rant" a producer from ITN came along
>> interested
>> in the same issue; as I understand, Rampart collective is currently
>> preparing a media strategy
>> to deal with the "spiel concocted for the media".
>>
>> There are three local campaigns with their own media contacts we are in
>> dialogue with :
>>
>> http://bethnalgreencentre.blogspot.com/
>> http://www.saveshoreditch.com/
>> http://open-shoreditch.blogspot.com/
>>
>> While I personally agree with Simon on the "normality" of this piece of
>> journalism, I am suprised by Tony's
>> abstract and cristallized polemic on the <<us>> and <<them>> of "anarchism"
>> and the failure to understand
>> an <<individualistic and theatrical >> strategy such as the situationist's
>> political theatre...
>> Situationism died 40 years ago in the streets of Paris !!! What happend in
>> the 40 years after 1968 ?
>>
>> I would be interested, in this matter, to listen to the opinion of Colin
>> Ward and his self-governing idea of
>> "anarchism in action"...all about ways of enabling people to take control
>> of their lives and partecipate in the
>> decision-making processes that affect them - in education, housing, the
>> environment built and natural, food, even
>> how water supplies are managed...
>>
>> Self-governing does not necessary means self-marginalisation !
>>
>>
>> Massimo
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Gerrard Winstanley wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Agreed,
>>>
>>> Fact is too many anarchists have a paranoid view of the 'fascist
>>> media' that too often ends up being a self fulfilling prophecy. They
>>> fail to understand the situationist concept of political theatre which
>>> works well with otherwise bored journalists.
>>>
>>> They don't see how direct action can resonate through the press and
>>> see activism as a series of localised events which they only want
>>> 'alternative' media to cover thus self-marginalising.
>>>
>>> People may remember in 1999 we had someone in one of the TV newsrooms
>>> who happened to be a massive Diggers fan and they were giving us
>>> sympathetic coverage almost every other day.
>>>
>>> Tony Gosling
>>>
>>> --- In diggers350 at yahoogroups.com <mailto:diggers350%40yahoogroups.com>,
>>>
>> Simon Fairlie <chapter7 at ...> wrote:
>>
>>>> I can see why a journalist might want to come along pretending to be
>>>> a punter. That way you are more likely to get ordinary treatment,
>>>> rather than the spiel concocted for the media. Isn't this simply
>>>> normal investigative journalism? We'd all be happy for a lefty
>>>> journalist to phone up Savils estate agency pretending to be a rich
>>>> client — indeed I've done it myself.
>>>>
>>>> Simon
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> From: suburbanstudio at ...
>>>>> Date: 29 April 2008 08:51:42 BDT
>>>>> To: diggers350 at yahoogroups.com <mailto:diggers350%40yahoogroups.com>
>>>>> Subject: Re: [diggers350] 'Estate agents' offer empty homes for
>>>>> squatrers
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> A bit more background in regard the article
>>>>> on the Daily "Cry" ...
>>>>>
>>>>> During the opening of the squatters estate agents at the
>>>>> new Shoreditch / London squatted social centre,
>>>>> (http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/04/396097.html
>>>>>
>> <http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2008/04/396097.html>)
>>
>>>>> a very curious guy came along. He was asking many questions
>>>>> and information beacuse - he said -he wanted to find
>>>>> a squat for himself...
>>>>>
>>>>> The day after, the same guy turn up, with a much better dress
>>>>> and an NUJ card... he his saying to be a journalist for the
>>>>> Daily Mail and want to do an article about the squatters estate
>>>>> agent. The answer was clear from our side.
>>>>>
>>>>> We were not interested to collaborate with a journalist we did not
>>>>> know, and in particularly for the the Daily Mail.......
>>>>>
>>>>> Finally the article appeared on the Mail on Sunday, together with
>>>>> detailed pictures of the building and the "estate agent"...
>>>>>
>>>>> I guess now, the question to Miles Goslett, and to the NUJ is...
>>>>> Why had he to cover up his identity coming along to the social centre
>>>>> pretending to be a squatter ?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Gerrard Winstanley wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> 'Estate agents' offer empty homes for squat
>>>>>>
>>>>>> By MILES GOSLETT
>>>>>> Last updated at 01:47am on 27th April 2008
>>>>>>
>>>>>> lots of pictures here
>>>>>> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?
>>>>>>
>> <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?>
>>
>>>>>> in_article_id=562325&in_page_id=1770 <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/
>>>>>>
>> <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/>
>>
>>>>>> pages/live/articles/news/news.html?
>>>>>> in_article_id=562325&in_page_id=1770>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> At first glance, they are the sort of glossy particulars you would
>>>>>> find in the window of any estate agent's.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> But, on closer inspection, most of the properties on offer 'boast'
>>>>>> some rather unusual features - such as boarded-up windows, possession
>>>>>> orders and no front-door entrance.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> The homes are being offered by Squatters Estate Agents, which has set
>>>>>> up a 'shop' in a derelict warehouse near the gleaming office
>>>>>> buildings
>>>>>> of the City of London.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> The new service is advertised on anti-capitalist websites and
>>>>>> prospective 'tenants' are directed to the premises - squatted, of
>>>>>> course - in the Shoreditch area of the capital.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> A reporter from this newspaper met James, an 'agent' in his late 20s,
>>>>>> wearing jeans, a T- shirt and several days' stubble, who guided us
>>>>>> through the details of dozens of ' available properties' on printed
>>>>>> sheets produced using a digital camera and a computer.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> He explained that the service was free and designed to guide others
>>>>>> like him into new digs.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?
>>>>>>
>> <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?>
>>
>>>>>> in_article_id=562325&in_page_id=1770 <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/
>>>>>>
>> <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/>
>>
>>>>>> pages/live/articles/news/news.html?
>>>>>> in_article_id=562325&in_page_id=1770>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
>
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