Do you know who Maria Ressa is?
I only vaguely knew of this renowned journalist who was accused of cyber libel in June 2020, and then the other night, PBS’ Frontline show had a great documentary on the threatened status of press freedom in the Philippines, focusing on Maria Ressa. She is a dynamo! Intensity and reslience packed into a small stature. Check out this documentary:
With press freedom under threat in the Philippines, A Thousand Cuts goes inside the escalating war between the government and the press. The documentary follows Maria Ressa, a renowned journalist who has become a top target of President Rodrigo Duterte’s crackdown on the news media. …
Her resoluteness, her confidence, and her forthrightness shine bright – so much so that she has remained ingrained in my mind for days. And I’ll venture to say, for years to come.
Ressa is a top target of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, having been an outspoken critic of his policies for many years – in particular, the extrajudicial killings, human rights violations, and fast-rising death toll from Duterte’s brutal war on drugs as well as the alleged pro-Duterte online “troll army” who were pushing out fake news stories and manipulating the narrative around his presidency. She has posted bail 9 times and has endured relentless political harrassment by the Duterte government and its supporters. Yet it doesn’t deter her from battling disinformation.
Bullies like Duterte don’t seem to faze Maria Ressa. (Would you expect less from someone who spent many years investigating terrorist networks in Southeast Asia?)
And she says she will not let herself be intimidated.
I love that about her!
For me, Maria Ressa is a ray of sunshine in these dark days of the pandemic. She is an inspiration for those who are deeply disgusted by the US wanna-be dictator who has repeatedly called the press the enemy of the people and has denounced any journalist who has committed the “crime” of criticizing him. She may be in the Philippines – she is by the way also a US citizen, but she nevertheless is an inspiration to many around the world who value and respect a free and open democracy.
Amendment I of the US Constitution clearly states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Similarly, Section 4 of the Bill of Rights in the 1987 Constitution of the Republic of the Philippines clearly states:
No law shall be passed abridging the freedom of speech, of expression, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances.
Nice to know the US Constitution has inspired others around the globe to enshrine similar rights into their own countries’ constitutions!
But not-so-nice to know that the most powerful man on earth has been inspired by the dictators of the world with regard to how to treat members of the press, as per his own acknowledgment.
Neither the leader of the Philippines nor the soon-to-be former leader of the United States like the press, let alone respect it. Well, arguably, no political “leader” does; however, but when you, Presidents Duterte and Trump, publicly single out journalists by belittling them in front of their peers at a press conference or at a mass rally of your followers because they wrote something you didn’t like, arrest them on allegedly politically motivated charges, insinuate that a certain journalist “could be a target for assassination”, laugh when your dictator buddy calls the press corps “spies”, announce in a jesting tone that you think it’d be a good idea to arrest and maybe “get rid of” journalists who criticize and contradict your mistatements with facts just like another dictator buddy, and worst of all, say that the press is the enemy of the people, then I’d say that you, Dear Leaders – and there’s more than two of you on this planet, have an unimaginable contempt for your fellow citizens. For those who elected you as well as those who did not.
Journalists are here to hold our elected leaders accountable! Every last one of them, from the local level all the way to the president.
It disturbed me recently that CBS News had recently put out a promotional ad about themselves stating the obvious: without a free press, we don’t have a free society. Probably not the exact words – I can’t think of them at this moment…but you get the idea.
I thought to myself: What?! This is what our president inspired – that a national media company felt compelled to remind the public of this?
Fortunately, we have courageous journalists like Maria Ressa here in the US, too. Like Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, who is one of my favorite investigative reporters and no stranger to having put her life on the line as has Maria, to report the news.
To Maria and Amy and all the intrepid journalists like yourselves out there in the world: you are essential to our freedom to live and breathe safely by keeping check on those in power, informing the public when you expose abuse, corruption, and goodness knows what else has occurred. You shine a spotlight into the dark nooks and crannies of our world for the public good. America needs you now more than ever. The world needs you.
I need you!
We can’t fight monsters by becoming monsters. ~ Maria Ressa
Sources
PBS Frontline
Rappler
Elle
Wikipedia
NPR
The Guardian
U.S. Constitution
constituteproject.org
Vox
Washington Post
National Review
Global News
The Guardian