Right to Know going global
A HIGH-POWER grouping of America’s biggest media outlets has thrown its weight behind Australia’s Your Right to Know campaign.
Washington-based Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press (RCFP) executive director Bruce Brown has launched a similar campaign with many of the main media outlets in the US, which he said had been informed by the Australian initiative.
“I cannot overemphasise how much we were shocked by what the state of the law was there,” Mr Brown said of Australian press freedom.
“We were shocked to see in Australia the conditions on the ground for reporters, particularly, you know, reporters whose work was touching on sensitive issues from the government. The Australian campaign is very timely and completely in step with what we’re trying to do here.”
The US campaign, spearheaded by RCFP and partnering with 30 media and tech organisations including The New York Times, Wall St Journal, The Washington Post and television networks CNN, NBC and ABC, opened Thursday local time with ads designed to show Americans the potential of taking for granted their free press.
“Today, there are real threats to press freedom, and your right to know the world around us,” the ad says.
“Some threats are obvious, some are easy to miss, but they all put our way of life at risk.”
Mr Brown, a leading media lawyer, said his group had found the Australian campaign “educative” and their “Protect Press Freedom” initiative stood solidly behind it.
He said his members had been shocked and dismayed earlier this year when Australian Federal Police officers raided the home of News Corp Australia reporter Annika Smethurst and ABC offices.
Mr Brown said the Protect Press Freedom initiative shared with the Your Right To Know campaign a desire to expose the “tension between national security and press freedom”.
The US campaign is focused on access to information and is nonpartisan.
“It’s trying to get people in the US to recommit themselves to seeing that the press is a part of our national consensus. The press as an institution is under stress now.”