Occupy the Mainstream Media

Occupy the Mainstream Media
 
In October, when two public radio producers were sacked in separate incidents for participating in the Occupy Movement, I was dismayed, but not surprised. NPR is often accused of liberal bias. But I can testify, as a former NPR freelancer, that the network's real slant lies neither to the right nor to the left, but to the spineless center, that is to say toward championing the views of mostly middle-aged white guys with money, power and influence, who are disproportionately represented on its airwaves, according to a recent study by FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting).


For me the most enduring images of the Occupation before Bloomberg raided Zuccotti Park was the computer bank from which the activists were live-streaming the event around the world. I found out about the occupation, not from the press, but from friends who emailed me links to these websites more than a week before the mass arrests on the Brooklyn Bridge catapulted the protest into the media spotlight.

A bunch of bloggers with handheld cameras had scooped the world on what may turn out to be the leading political story of 2011. Equally important, they were bypassing the gate-keepers in the press and telling their own story in their own terms -- arguably the first populist movement in history to do so.

Well, not quite the first. The Arab Spring has that distinction.

That the Occupy Movement sprang up hot on the heels of this historic uprising, and indeed resembles it in so many ways, tells us that the worldwide contagion of events, rather than the pronouncements of the self-anointed opinion-makers, is the driving force in the digital age, and the social media rather than the mainstream press is now in the driver's seat. 

That may be the biggest news of all to come out of the Occupy Movement.