I was there. Protests were peaceful, until the cops started throwing grenades and arresting folks. I took some photos from a distance[1], and also posted a couple videos to twitter[2][3]. There was a heavy police presence on Friday (inauguration day), which was in stark contrast to Saturday (the Women's March), in which the police were noticeably absent. Not surprisingly, there was no violence during the Women's March because there were no police to antagonize people.

I remember watching a journalist who'd been pepper sprayed by police wash his eyes with bottled water, just outside the restaurant we'd stopped at for lunch.

We live in troubling times.

[1]: https://goo.gl/photos/GfrxTZV4sADJqtgH7

[2]: https://twitter.com/brndnmtthws/status/822520102973095936

[3]: https://twitter.com/brndnmtthws/status/822530371841622017

So you're saying that the police antagonized people, and that made them so angry that they set a limo on fire? That doesn't ring true to me. It makes much more sense the other way: the police were there because they were needed, to protect bystanders and property from the mob.

Police is always there during these types of protests. There's plenty of peaceful protests with police around.

It's absolutely possible that, if the police starts being violent, the violence spreads very quickly and cars get set on fire. Crowd control has a lot of strategy to it...

99% of people walk a march and 1% torch private property (a limousine): clearly the "mob" is in the wrong.

That's a pretty uncharitable interpretation of parent's comment. I read it as "to protect bystanders and property from the mob [that was violent]".

And his point seemed to be that police being "noticeably absent" from peaceful protests is more simply explained by the fact that those protests were peaceful rather than police presence being the source of violence.

Police brutality is a real issue but indiscriminately blaming the police every time they show up doesn't help the cause.

> Police brutality is a real problem but blindly blaming the police every time they show up doesn't help the cause.

Let's not give the police the benefit of the doubt. Time and time again across the nation it has been shown that law enforcement is not for the populace-at-large but for the betterment of the state and its agenda - whoever the party in charge.

Do you have evidence that the police arrested the peaceful ones?

Thank you for the report. But without specifics about the circumstances of the arrest I still can't make an informed opinion yet.

The administration's extreme anti-press behaviour for the past week (and the months prior to that) contribute far more to those opinions.

The "facts" are official sentences such as "we will hold the press accountable", "news media should keep its mouth shut", Spicer lying to the press on day 0 and treating the media as hate objects, etc...

These police are employed by the DC city government, which is run by Democrats.

Link to arrests of journalists which took place before Trump was president: https://www.google.com/search?q=dc+metro+police+arrest+journ...

While Trump's views on the First Amendment are disturbing, these arrests do not seem related.

Agreed. I read the article waiting to see the other side of the story, or a least some hints as to what possible justification there could be for the charges. When the other side of the story isn't even mentioned, I'm not sure it qualifies as journalism (even for an opinion piece, that's pretty lousy).

It seems we've entered an era of mostly one-sided journalism - a.k.a. persuasive storytelling.

Here's the other side of the story, it's right in the article:

>The Metropolitan Police Department in Washington declined to comment Wednesday on why the journalists had been charged along with protesters.

And that right there is the sad part. People actually believe that line makes a news piece fair and objective. It's lazy journalism, especially given the headline.

News flash: when asked about these kinds of things, it's very common for the police to decline to comment. The job of a reporter doesn't (or shouldn't) stop there.

Sorry, you don't just get to say, "this side of the story was easy to write, so we wrote it; it was too hard to find anything for the other side, so we're publishing anyway and that's a fair representation of the facts."

So no one can report on anything when the authority with power refuse to comment on why they imprisoned a citizen?

How does that work exactly?

The police will make their case at a public trial where all sides can present evidence. That's the best system we've come up with for arriving at the truth.

Unfortunately, it requires a bit of patience (weeks or maybe a few months).

Well then, how would you report on it in a way that is appropriate?

Just... don't tell anyone anything until March when we have more information?

Come on, don't just complain. It's easy to complain! Everyone complains, all the time. It's totally non-constructive and achieves nothing.

What's the right way of doing it, if this is the wrong way?

What's so bad about waiting until March?

Just a few ideas off the top of my head (I'm sure there are a lot of other sources as well):

- Interview people who were there about what the journalists were actually doing and what happened when they were detained

- Mention the political background of the reporters and/or any history of participating in protests

- Explore legal precedents and ask experts to help explain why they may have been arrested

- At least mention the fact that if we don't know all the facts, we can't assume they were wrongfully charged

EDIT: If you disagree with my comments, please explain why you disagree rather than simply downvoting (ironically, downvoting for the sake of political disagreement only serves a purpose aligned with one-sided journalism - i.e., silencing opposing viewpoints in hopes of advancing one's own political ideology rather than promoting healthy dialogue). Thanks!

> Interview people who were there about what the journalists were actually doing and what happened when they were detained

Where do you find these people? I assume the piece was written after the protest was over, so there's no way to confirm who was there, and if their story is true. Even so, here's what the article says:

>> Witnesses reported that sweeping arrests during the parade targeted rioters, protesters and journalists indiscriminately.

> Mention the political background of the reporters and/or any history of participating in protests

Ok, great. However, I'm pretty sure if one of the reporters had prior incidents with protests, that would surface pretty quickly. It could be that there's no reason to mention the lack of prior incidents.

> Explore legal precedents and ask experts to help explain why they may have been arrested

What are the experts in these situations? Here's (another) quote from the article:

>> The charges against the journalists — Evan Engel, Alexander Rubinstein, Jack Keller, Matthew Hopard, Shay Horse and Aaron Cantu — have been denounced by organizations dedicated to press freedom. All of those arrested have denied participating in the violence.

The accused have denied participation and "organizations dedicated to press freedom" (are they experts?) have denounced the charges.

> At least mention the fact that if we don't know all the facts, we can't assume they were wrongfully charged

Guilty until proven innocent? That's a troubling attitude to take, especially with all the uncertainties the new Trump administration brings.

> The accused have denied participation and "organizations dedicated to press freedom" (are they experts?) have denounced the charges

I'm pretty sure that, by definition, those would probably be the most biased source you could possibly find. So no, not experts for the sake of balanced reporting. If the article is going to include their opinions, it might as well include the opinion of a random police officer, or at least a lawyer who has dealt with similar cases.

> Guilty until proven innocent?

Nobody said that or implied it. Trump may be president, but in case you weren't aware, the country's legal and judicial systems are no different now than they were a week ago.

What I am saying is that fair journalism shouldn't assume either guilt or innocence in the absence of facts. If you disagree with that then I'm not sure there's much I can say or do to convince you otherwise.

> - Interview people who were there about what the journalists were actually doing and what happened when they were detained

Agreed

> - Mention the political background of the reporters and/or any history of participating in protests

That is (or should be) irrelevant unless you want to support a story. We do not know if they were actively involved.

If you say they were Democrats, some people can conclude they provoked it. Others may think it's the Republicans attacking innocent journalists.

Same with being active in the past. How does that tell anything about this case without creating bias.

What if I was active in environmental protests, but I just cover politics as a job?

> - Explore legal precedents and ask experts to help explain why they may have been arrested

You would need to ask the policemen. Not the "grunts", the ones who gave the order. They should know why they gave it. But they declined to comment. So the answer of any expert might be "if they were detained, they probably did something wrong".

> - At least mention the fact that if we don't know all the facts, we can't assume they were wrongfully charged

I believe we should conclude "they were brought in and it could be for a number of reasons:

a) they broke the law b) they refused to cooperate c) they didn't to the best of their ability prevent someone from breaking the law (I don't know if this concept applies in USA, I'm from Czech Republic) - that includes even just calling a cop d) they were scooped up to sort out later (determine their contribution or provide testimony) e) it was a mistake"

I tend to sound forceful, but I'm not ill willed. I'm trying to raise some points that I think do or don't bring value to reporting on this issue.

Thanks

And it's this kind of reporting that fuels the need for 'alternate facts' because the facts presented so often leave a lot to be desired.

So because the police refused to comment on felony charges and imprisonment of journalists and citizens... no one can report on anything...

AND this apparently excuses the President's Press Secretary to spend his first press conference insisting on and threatening news outlets over grotesque lies about the size of a crowd?

Is this like a joke thread?

Sorted out soon? The reporters have court dates set in mid-February and March[0]. Now every other reporter is under the chilling effect of knowing they might arrested and taken to court for simply covering a protest.

[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/jan/24/journalists-ch...

Being falsely arrested raises the profile of a journalist without much of a downside. I doubt it will have a chilling effect.

I raise it here because I think it's important for us to dig into the details. Any time 200+ people are indiscriminately arrested, I think we should look closely.

They were charged for lighting a limo on fire. Not exactly reporting.

Where in the article does it state this? As far as I can tell, they were swept up with others during one of the few violent parts of the protests and are now being charged on what is effectively a technicality.

Because people never get charged for stuff they didn't do.

You are stating that reporters lit a limousine on fire. Do you honestly believe this?

Good thing you read the article instead of rushing here to defend an authoritarian threatening freedom of speech.

The journalists were not involved with the limo burning... they were caught up in the literally hundreds (yes, hundreds) of people arrested... when everyone knows only a tiny fraction of them were involved with the limo or the few isolated incidents of vandalism.

[citation needed]

GP is making it up, so no citation is possible