[stop-imf] Media Distortion of World Bank/IMF Protests (fwd)

[Robert Weissman]

                                 FAIR-L
                    Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting
               Media analysis, critiques and news reports




ACTION ALERT:
Media Distortion of World Bank/IMF Protests Starts Early

April 11, 2000

Mainstream media have begun to turn their attention to Washington, D.C.,
and the Mobilization for Global Justice, a week-long series of protests
coinciding with the meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary
Fund (IMF) scheduled for April 16 and 17. Many of the stories draw
parallels between the events in D.C. and the World Trade Organization
(WTO) protests in Seattle last year ("Seattle Protesters Are Back, With a
New Target, " New York Times, 4/9/00).

But recent TV news broadcasts have distorted or omitted basic facts about
the upcoming protests. On April 6, ABC World News Tonight aired a story
about people arriving for an "unusual demonstration" focused on "American
trade relations with China."  The broadcast never even mentioned the wider
targets of the protest: the World Bank and the IMF.

On the same night, CBS Evening News presented a report loaded with
inaccuracies. Anchor Dan Rather opened by warning protesters that "if
they're hoping for a replay of last year's violence in Seattle, those
charged with keeping the peace in Washington, D.C., have other ideas."

The report continues with this distortion of the Seattle protests: "By all
accounts, protesters outside last December's meeting of the World Trade
Organization in Seattle simply got the better of police."

That conclusion is certainly not the consensus of "all accounts." The
firsthand accounts of activists and bystanders alike depicted a police
force in Seattle remarkable for its brutality, not its inadequacy. It is
doubtful that many activists who were beaten or gassed at the WTO protests
feel they "got the better" of the police force. (See "Pepper Spray Gets in
Their Eyes: Media missed militarization of police work in Seattle,"
Extra!, 3-4/00, http://www.fair.org/extra/0003/pepper-spray.html .)

Nonetheless, the idea that protesters are interested in creating violence
is reinforced later in the broadcast, where correspondent Jim Stewart
incorrectly asserts that activists are "practicing urban assault
techniques" in preparation for the protests. Ironically, moments later the
report features Ruckus Society program director Han Shan advocating
non-violence.

The media focus on the potential for "violence" by the D.C. protesters
reflects a rewriting of what actually happened at Seattle. The New York
Times (4/9/00) was typical when it referred to "the unrest in Seattle,
where a rare alchemy of violence and vandalism by a small group of
anarchists botched crowd control."

In fact, police began using chemical agents against non-violent protesters
long before a handful of WTO opponents engaged in window-breaking. (See
"Prattle in Seattle," Extra!, 1-2/00,
http://www.fair.org/extra/0001/wto-prattle.html .) Media accounts have
consistently reversed the chronology, however, blaming the police violence
on the vandals, who in fact were largely ignored by police. The vast
majority of violence-- which is a different thing than vandalism-- was
committed in Seattle by the Seattle police department.

ACTION: Please contact these media outlets in the next few days, and
encourage them to cover the protests against the World Bank and IMF fully
and fairly. You might suggest that they begin by including the views of
anti-World Bank and IMF activists on issues other than the potential for
violence.


CONTACT: CBS Evening News Phone: (212) 975-3691, (202) 457-4385 Fax: (212)
975-1893 mailto:audsvcs@cbs.com

ABC World News Tonight
Phone: (212) 456-4040
Fax: (212) 456-4297
mailto:netaudr@abc.com

New York Times
Washington, DC Bureau
Fax: (202) 862-0340
mailto:harland@nytimes.com

For background on the protests, please visit http://www.a16.org .
Independent media coverage of the protests will be featured at
http://www.indymedia.org

As always, please remember that letter are taken more seriously if they
maintain a polite tone. Please cc your correspondence to:
mailto:fair@fair.org

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