FASCISTS USE THE MEDIA TO PUSH THEIR MESSAGE.
JOURNALISTS CAN STOP THEM.
Leaked messages from servers used by neo-Nazis show that journalists often play right into the hands of white supremacist groups: spreading their message, inflating their importance, and leaving their motives unchallenged.
In this Study Hall guide, journalists Erin Corbett and Elizabeth King, who have covered the far-right for years, show how journalists can effectively report on these violent idealogues, and help stop the spread of their message.
Published May 2019
JUMP TO:
// INTRODUCTION //
// AVOIDING NET GAINS FOR FASCISTS IN YOUR REPORTING //
// MAKING SURE IT’S REALLY A STORY WORTH COVERING //
// YOU DON’T NEED INSIDE ACCESS //
// CONTEXTUALIZING FASCIST QUOTES //
// COVERING POLICE AND FASCISTS //
// PHOTOJOURNALISM AND VIDEOJOURNALISM //
// RESOURCES // TIP-SHEET // EXAMPLES OF COVERAGE //
The U.S. has seen a surge of white nationalist organizing in the last two years. Far-right groups have been recruiting and organizing to get their members elected to public office. Racist attacks on marginalized communities have been on the rise, as far-rightists see an ally in the White House in President Donald Trump.
In this moment, journalists play an important role and, we believe, we can’t be neutral if we hope to combat fascism. There’s no room for so-called objectivity right now, and approaching coverage of white nationalism from a neutral or objective standpoint can serve in its favor.
White nationalists are violent. They believe in, advocate for, and act in service of maintaining white supremacy through violent and deadly means. Reporting on white nationalist groups — protected by and sometimes even working with the government — through a lens of neutrality, can only enable fascism. Instead, we can all do better to connect the rise of fascism in this moment to the capitalist state, which empowers it.
The way we report on fascism, and the platforms we give to fascists have serious consequences — sometimes life or death. Not only are fascists organizing in our communities, they are also successfully securing powerful positions in Trump’s White House, where they are creating and implementing policy. Remembering the connection between white nationalist groups and their institutional support, and reporting on fascism in a way that seeks to call out and hold accountable those institutions can and should guide our work moving forward.
In many ways, the excessive platforming of Trump’s campaign and his violent rhetoric during the 2016 election helped Trump win, and gave rise to fascism. A New York Times study conducted in early 2016 found that Trump received more than $2 billion worth of free media coverage during his campaign. Three major cable news networks even aired footage of Trump’s empty podium for a half hour, while choosing to ignore a Hillary Clinton speech to union workers.
Pundits often shared space with Trump surrogates on nightly CNN panels in the marketplace of ideas, while digital outlets that produce heavily aggregated news pieces often relied on “outrage clicks” for profit. Some journalists who covered the 2016 election (myself included) hoped that fact-checking Trump and his supporters’ false claims would suffice. It didn’t.
Giving the president constant platforms from which to make false statements and demonize marginalized communities, like his years-long attacks on immigrants, not only helps the spread of these inaccuracies, but also reaches people who will respond to them with deadly violence. And they already have. One Nazi who posted frequently online about the migrant caravan went on to murder 11 people in a Pittsburgh synagogue last year. What we choose to platform, and how we report on it, matters.
The president and his followers have also made journalists a target of violence through myriad attacks on the media that do and will continue to impact vulnerable reporters the most.
Trump’s “fake news” attacks on the media have inspired violence against journalists, including targeted harassment campaigns on Twitter; the shooting at the Capital Gazette in Maryland that killed five people; and more recently, leaked documents show the Trump administration tracked journalists and immigration advocates tied to the migrant caravan, as armed right-wing militias terrorize border communities.
We need new journalistic standards when covering politics and the far right in 2019 and beyond.
This guide is meant to be a starting point for journalists who are new to covering the far right, or interested in changing the ways they cover the far right so that they don’t end up empowering them.
//AVOIDING ANY NET GAINS FOR FASCISTS IN YOUR REPORTING//
Reporting on the far right from the standpoint of wanting to help take fascism down means making sure you don’t do them any favors, even unintentionally. It’s possible that well-intentioned journalists may be duped, especially if they’re not familiar with fascist movements, and even more so if the journalist comes from a position of privilege, and therefore doesn’t have experience being targeted by racism, xenophobia, misogyny, and so on.
There are things to keep in mind when reporting on fascists that will make it much more challenging for the fascist individual or organization in question to benefit from the coverage in any way.
Fascists (like many politicians, and other sources with an agenda to push) are liars, and while they are not smart or intellectual as they are sometimes portrayed in the press, they can be clever and successfully manipulative. A perfect example of the press taking a fascist at his word—and in so doing giving him a veneer of undeserved intellectual value—is the infamous American fascist Richard Spencer.
Spencer, like all fascists, believes and espouses warped, factually untrue things about the world, and seeks to spread his dangerous ideology as far as he needs to. Still, some members of the press framed Spencer’s 2018 university tour the same way he did, in terms of free speech rights. A number of pundits opined that protesting fascists on college campuses just gave them more power. In turn, the anti-racists and anti-fascists who have protested college speaking appearances by Spencer, far-right figure Milo Yiannopoulos, Bell Curve author Charles Murray, and others, are often criminalized in the mainstream press. The press bought into the red-baiting “Antifa” boogeyman, while treating Spencer, a neo-nazi, as if he has something of academic value to contribute.
Journalists can avoid representing fascists as valuable sources. One of the easiest ways to make this evident in reporting is to remember that fascists, white supremacists, and other far-right sources will lie about their intentions in order to gain access to platforms they wouldn’t otherwise have access to, such as universities and cable news interviews. It is not enough to simply make note that fascists are liars and hypocrites. The press must also demonstrate the threat of fascism by linking fascists to violence they have committed or with which they are associated.
Fascists often claim that they’re crusading in the name of free speech, debate, and democracy, when in reality the far right commits acts of violence against those they have deemed to be “other.”
Spencer and many of his “alt-right” supporters claimed during his university tour that he was interested in free speech rights, and the press took him at his word, while often ignoring that he helped organize and participated in “Unite the Right” in Charlottesville in 2017. Spencer helped draw a massive crowd of various far-rightists to Charlottesville, where he led the now-infamous torchlight rally where anti-racist students and community members were beaten. The next day, more people were beaten by far-right racists, and one woman was killed. Situating these heinous acts of fascist violence in connection to Spencer (and any other participant) makes the truth of the matter clear.
Not only does their agenda of a white ethno-state necessarily mean that they are not invested in free speech despite repeated claims, but fascists including Spencer himself have stated in no uncertain terms that the “alt-right” does not actually believe in free speech.
Another element to bear in mind is that a fascist is very unlikely to speak to the press unless they think they can get something out of it for themselves, their group, and/or their cause. What they may want in particular will of course vary. Maybe a fascist is reaching out with a tip about insider information in a group, but is hoping to stir controversy related to group-infighting, a hallmark trait of these organizations. Perhaps they want to distance themselves from incriminating events, like “Unite the Right.” Following any kind of criminal bust, fascists are very likely to attempt to publicly distance themselves from the event, while approving of it in private.
Though the fascist cell Identity Evropa is currently trying to rebrand as the American Identity Movement, in part to distance itself from its role in “Unite the Right,” participation in the Charlottesville rally is a matter of pride among the group’s members.
One such example is this member of the group bragging in a private Discord server about “serving” in Charlottesville.
In a lot of cases, though, fascists want attention for their organization so that they can recruit more members and raise funds.
//MAKE SURE IT’S REALLY A STORY WORTH COVERING//
A report from the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) — an organization that tracks hate groups but frequently works with law enforcement and targets leftists and anti-racists — found that the dissemination of white supremacist propaganda increased by 182% in 2018 compared to the prior year. Fascist groups like Identity Evropa and Patriot Front post flyers, especially on college campuses, as a recruitment tactic.
But more specifically, these groups use the media as a tool to propagate their white supremacist messages and recruit new members. Fascist groups are particularly enthusiastic about the media coverage that follows their flyering campaigns, as leaked Discord logs show.
In an Identity Evropa chat room called “media_about_ie,” members exchanged thousands of messages about the various news reports on their activism, sometimes praising the coverage. The reports that received the most approval from members were stories that shared photos of the group’s flyers. Some members described these reports as “free advertising.”
Members of the fascist group Patriot Front — who are known for their violence at Unite the Right and for shooting at protestors countering a Richard Spencer event at the University of Florida — have also boasted of the “free advertising” in their own chat rooms.
Several members of Identity Evropa discussed their attempts at duping local newsrooms into covering their flyering and stickering campaigns by contacting reporters directly and expressing faux outrage over a fascist flyer they spotted in their community. In reality, members of the group said they had reached out to local newsrooms themselves after posting the flyers, because local newsrooms have boosted fascist propaganda on multiple occasions.
A flyer alone is not a story, but if you do find yourself reporting on flyering campaigns, don’t include white nationalist imagery (tweets, too!) in your work.
//YOU DON’T NEED INSIDE ACCESS//
It’s not just local news outlets that make mistakes when covering fascists.
Last fall, NBC’s Today invited the executive director of Identity Evropa on for an interview about the group’s white nationalist ideology and recruiting efforts. The coverage — during which Today host Peter Alexander did not offer much pushback against Patrick Casey’s comments about so-called identitarianism — was met with backlash from journalists covering the far right, and antifascists who monitor it.
As expected, followers of the fascist organization were thrilled by the platform afforded to their director, with one member joking that the show was endorsing their hate group. After the interview aired, members were thankful that Today did not explicitly push back against Casey or their group, while some were thrilled the broadcast allegedly lead to a surge in applications.
“I feel like we owe [Today] something after so many applications today,” said one member, while another joked that the interview was an endorsement of the hate group.
Likewise, an article published by The Outline last year essentially profiled, and by extension platformed the fascist group after one journalist went undercover to Identity Evropa’s “Leading Our People Forward” conference. The writer stated clearly: “I wanted to understand Identity Evropa. So I became one of them.” But you don’t need to join a fascist group to understand that members are actively organizing a movement that advocates genocide of non-white people.
The article starts with the journalist interviewing with the fascist group in an effort to become a member, and while it sheds light on their membership process, the article also sensationalizes it with commentary such as: “This was unlike any interview I’d ever had. Then again, I’d never tried [to] join a pro-white Identitarian group.”
Rather than pushing back against the group’s narrative, the journalist joined them to get an inside story. But insider access to fascists can allow them to control the narrative when journalists need to be especially careful and critical of the coverage and platforms we are providing fascists. In general, journalists shouldn’t seek inside access to Nazis, and should instead focus our reporting on people affected by fascism and white supremacy. Any platform we give to Nazis risks disseminating their violent ideology more than educating people on it and stopping it from spreading.
There are some exceptions, of course. The thousands of chat logs leaked to Unicorn Riot, a decentralized non-profit media collective, in recent years by antifascist researchers have helped expose law enforcement, members of the military, and even political campaign staffers actively involved in fascist organizing. But the distinction is important here because journalists aren’t directly seeking out fascist sources, and are instead receiving leaked conversations from researchers who monitor the far right. In this case, your sources are antifascists.
Identity Evropa’s leaked Discord server shows that members of the group weren’t unhappy about the coverage in The Outline. As one member wrote to the “media_about_ie” server: “Other than some comments about Jews it makes us sound good. Honestly if (sic) I would probably show this to a normie to promote IE.”
//CONTEXTUALIZE FASCIST QUOTES//
When reporting a story about fascists or fascism and considering including comment from a fascist, it’s important to contextualize whatever spin the fascist will inevitably hand you. Part of being prepared to speak with a fascist, or even just to interpret anything else they’ve said or written, is understanding the different terms for various racist far-right ideologies.
As researcher of neo-fascism Michael Isaacson writes in his zine, “You Can’t Punch Every Nazi,” fascists use various terms to describe themselves, sometimes to deceive un-knowing outsiders, other times because they genuinely ascribe to a certain strain of far-right ideology. For example: a reporter is likely to encounter terms like “Identitarian,” neo-Nazi, and neo-confederate in their work on the far right. Learning the differences between these ideologies, and which ones serve as mere euphemisms, is vital for reporting on fascism. Becoming familiar with these different terms and ideologies will help contextualize and frame any information you’re reporting from a fascist source, including original quotes for an article.
Also consider why the fascist is willing to participate in an interview with a journalist who is not sympathetic to them. What could they potentially gain by talking to you for your article? Whatever it is they stand to gain is helpful to their movement and therefore harmful to the targets of that movement.
Abby Ohlheiser, a digital culture reporter at The Washington Post is quoted in the excellent Data & Society report, The Oxygen of Amplification, asking the question: “To whom you are being ‘fair’” when quoting fascists. As a general rule of thumb, the report suggests that reporters ask themselves a critical question before decided whether or not to get an original quote from a fascist: Who will including this quote help? “if the answer to that question is ‘just the Nazi,’” the report says, “reporters should think twice about their approach.”
There are times where reporters have successfully bested fascists in interviews, revealing them to be liars, or stripping them of remaining plausible deniability regarding their activism and beliefs. For example, The New York Times investigated white nationalist Elliot Kline’s (better known as Eli Mosley) claims about his own military record last year. As part of the investigation, the Times confronted Mosley in an interview with information that contradicted various stories he’d told and claims he’d made about fighting in the Iraq war. The interview, which the Times filmed, exposed Mosley as a fraud, just when he was climbing the ranks in Identity Evropa, and after he had participated in “Unite the Right” in Charlottesville.
While filming a documentary, The Guardian editor-at-large Gary Younge got Spencer on-camera claiming that white supremacy is beneficial for Black people. Younge was adversarial, and pushed back on each racist and inaccurate claim Spencer made, while also flatly telling Spencer: “It’s such a ridiculous notion… that people forcibly removed from their homes and taken to this country to work for nothing for a couple of centuries, that that benefited them.” Younge also wrote a column about the interview after it went viral, explaining why he felt interviewing Spencer “was a risk worth taking.”
Applying the level of critical thinking suggested in the Data & Society report, journalists may reconsider the decision to quote fascists in their work; other times it may pay off, but there’s no guarantees and it is a risk, as Younge noted. After all: fascists lie, have a record of successfully manipulating journalists for their own advantage, are almost always linked to bigoted violence, and believe in genocide—they are not exactly ideal or even typical sources! The decision to use a fascist as a source should be made with the utmost care.
Quotes and material from the far right should be viewed in the same light as a report from the oil industry on global warming should be viewed: skeptically.
It goes without saying that any lies a fascist tells that will be included in an article should be debunked and the truth should be plainly stated.
Exposing and countering lies with facts is important but this alone is insufficient. It’s critical to deprive fascists of any chance to use your reporting to recruit to the movement and spread their propaganda.
All of this also applies when a journalist is not getting original comment from a story, but is quoting from fascist propaganda, social media accounts, previous press interviews, and so on. Sometimes it may be necessary to directly quote from fascist materials, but the focus should be on the harm fascists cause to others, rather than on the fascists themselves, and their inherently warped and dangerous viewpoints.
//COVERING POLICE AND FASCISTS//
Journalists covering the far right will inevitably run into the relationship between the police and the far right. The two are not necessarily distinct entities, but journalists often treat the police as neutral toward or even hostile to fascist groups, when the reality is often quite the opposite.
For example, in 2018 The Guardian reported on collaboration between California law enforcement and fascists against anti-racist activists. According to The Guardian, lawyers for an anti-fascist organizer and teacher who was arrested and charged with assault and rioting for protesting a neo-Nazi rally in Sacramento in 2016 “obtained numerous examples of [California Highway Patrol] officers working directly with the [Traditionalist Worker Party], often treating the white nationalist group as victims and the anti-fascists as suspects.” Court documents revealed that police worked with the now-defunct neo-Nazi organization, the Traditionalist Worker Party to “identify counter-protesters and sought the prosecution of activists with “anti-racist” beliefs.”
Ashoka Jegroo, an NYC-based reporter who has been covering leftist protests in the city for years and reports on police abuses says that the media should not treat police as neutral actors. This is because the police and fascist entities often collaborate or otherwise help one another; the frequent cooperation between the police and fascists is often referred to by some as "cops and the Klan go hand-in-hand" or just "cops and the Klan.”
“The first thing that comes to mind that journalists tend to get wrong is thinking that the police are just a neutral party between fascists and anti-fascists and are just trying to keep everyone safe. Of course, even worse are journalists who think that police are allies in the fight against fascism,” Jegroo tells Study Hall. He notes that the pattern of papering-over the role of the police is a common issue in coverage of the far right, but also within watchdog organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League. The ADL tracks white supremacist violence, and also coordinates with the Israeli Defense Forces to train some US law enforcement, demonstrating how some groups that counter fascist groups still have friendly relationships with law enforcement.
Police are not neutral actors, as studies and various news reports over the decades have demonstrated that cops tend to be right-wing. Police departments are known to discriminate against black and brown people, queer and trans people, poor people, women, and the disabled. Yet, it’s common for reporters to treat the police as impartial authorities on the far right.
Journalist Jennifer Reitman recently bylined a feature for The New York Times magazine in which she interviewed former law enforcement officers (among others) about how to deal with the white nationalist threat.
“Asking cops for their ideas on how to counter the fascist threat is just plain absurd. You're almost bound to be given disinformation,” Jegroo says. “As cases in Sacramento and Portland have shown, the police are much more likely to be working with fascists in order to better target and repress anti-fascists. In both those cases, the cops saw the anti-fascists as the ‘real’ threat.”
Covering fascists will necessarily include covering the police, and the relationship between the two. Responsible reporting on police and fascists will not treat police as neutral actors, perhaps especially in circumstances like fascist rallies or protests where police routinely keep their backs to fascists while facing off with, arresting, and otherwise intimidating antifascists. Police statements must be taken into the proper context, fact-checked, and countered with perspectives outside of law enforcement.
In the end, covering fascists and the police is much like doing good journalism on any other topic: information garnered from people with an agenda should be viewed skeptically. Cops are no different. When quoting police, it’s essential to reach out to those who have a contentious relationship with them, as opposed to taking the police for their word.
Examples of who to reach out to include: local antifascist organizations, anti-fascist and anti-racist protesters at rallies, local community organizations who focus on racial, immigrant, gender, and sexuality justice. These stakeholders will have a much better assessment of how fascism and racism are harming their communities, and thoughts about solutions.
//PHOTOJOURNALISM AND VIDEOJOURNALISM//
Last year, antifascists and anti-racists rallied, marched and protested in the streets of Charlottesville, Va. and Washington, D.C. on the one-year anniversary of the deadly “Unite the Right” rally. These activists largely outnumbered a handful of white supremacists and Nazis, denying them a platform and a space to organize openly.
During and following the demonstrations on August 12, 2018, some reporters painted antifascists as “bad” or “dangerous,” claiming that they attacked journalists.
An article in The Washington Post published two days after the rally smeared antifascists as acting violently toward reporters, falsely accusing them of fighting journalists. But the Post’s own report details several instances of journalists not respecting the activists’ autonomy, and even linked back to the racist, far-right publication Breitbart to support the claims.
Per the Post:
When a Washington Post reporter tried to interview the antifascists, they refused to speak. When he followed them up the street with his cellphone camera, one of them shoved a black umbrella into his lens and several shouted: “No photos!”
“This can harm us,” one of the protesters said, just before someone swatted the reporter’s iPhone out of his hand and threw it into the middle of the street.
The reporter continued:
Blocks away, a photographer in a rain poncho was recorded being chased through an alley, while a woman berated other journalists.
“You’re betraying us!” she yelled. “Are you going to report how many people they tear-gassed?”
The instances described above are examples of photojournalists putting people in danger by not respecting their autonomy, while also focusing coverage on the false narrative of violent antifascists, which can undermine their work and put them in harm’s way. People’s autonomy should be respected regardless of who they are — if people don’t want photos or videos taken of them, especially if they are fighting fascists, journalists should listen and balance this with their duty to report. There are other ways of capturing events without interfering with the activities of antifascists and anti-racists.
According to Daniel Hosterman, a documentary photographer who has covered anti-fascism since Trump’s inauguration in 2017, First Amendment protections for photojournalists are valuable, but not more important than the safety of the subject. Likewise, when activists ask not to be photographed they aren’t doing so to hinder photojournalists’ First Amendment rights, but instead to protect their right to remain autonomous.
“Your rights to photograph should be used to hold the powerful accountable, not to justify taking advantage of the vulnerable,” Hosterman told Study Hall.
Antifascists and anti-racists have legitimate safety concerns when confronting white supremacists and the police in the streets, and journalists have an ethical responsibility to consider these concerns in our coverage. “Any photographs you make of them can cause material, existential harm,” Hosterman said.
For antifascist and anti-racist organizers, the threat is twofold. Far-left activists countering fascism face repression from white power activists, who use images taken at actions to identify, harass and threaten violence against them, known as doxxing.
“We've seen the various doxxing campaigns from both the right and left over the past few years, and these photographs become ammunition, confirming one's presence at a certain rally or protest, who they communicate with, and what groups and organizations they affiliate with,” a member of the Richmond, Virginia-based Antifa Seven Hills (ASH) told Study Hall. “They become important pieces of the puzzle when attempting to determine someone's identity.”
These activists also face legal threats from police and the government, which use images and videos taken at protests for the same aforementioned purposes, and as evidence to connect organizers to specific actions and locations in their efforts to criminalize dissent.
When more than 200 people — including activists, journalists, legal observers, and street medics — were arrested for protesting and covering Trump’s inauguration in 2017, some photographers had their equipment seized and confiscated by police who sought to create a timeline of the day’s events. This is just one example under Trump.
Because many people now carry cameras, including smartphones, we must keep in mind that the images we capture at actions “could be used to create dossiers on individual dissidents, assist prosecutions by the state, and even facilitate general harassment and violence by the State and right-wing and white power extremists,” said the member of ASH. The anti-fascist group suggests broadening the scope and framing of the photograph.
Hosterman says photojournalists should consider the power dynamics that exist in the spaces they’re photographing, and uses the following map to inform what he photographs at actions, and how:
-Are there police present?
-Are there particularly vulnerable people present?
-Who are the oppressors and who are the oppressed?
-Where do I fit into these dynamics as a cis white man?
-Are there crimes being committed?
-Who has the power in this situation and how can my photographs help shed light on the transgressions of those folks?
Activists suggest asking before photographing moments of resistance, waiting for people to adjust disguises before photographing, or changing the focus of your photograph.
The Southern Poverty Law Center. Most journalists who cover US politics are probably already familiar with the Southern Poverty Law Center. It’s a great resource for research on the far-right and for tracking individual fascists as well as fascist groups. The Center employs a number of researchers and reporters who frequently give comment to the press, and can be a great resource. History buffs or investigative journalists may also find the SPLC’s extensive historical collection at Duke University helpful.
Political Research Associates. The Somerville, MA-based think tank Political Research Associates publishes investigative research on the far right in the US. PRA publishes helpful reports and progressive analysis of the far right, and has a wealth of other guides and information on its website. The organization also publishes a quarterly magazine and a blog, and has a range of experts available to speak to the press about a range of issues pertaining to fascism and the far right.
One People’s Project and Idavox. According to its website, “One People’s Project’s mission is simple: to research and report on who’s who and what’s what regarding right-wing groups, individuals, and activities.” OPP and its accompanying media outlet, Idavox, have a wealth of information about individual fascists and groups. The founder of both, Daryle Lamont Jenkins, is frequently quoted by journalists as an expert on the far right.
“The Oxygen of Amplification.” Parts of this guide drew on assistant professor at Syracuse University Whitney Phillips’ report for Data & Society, The Oxygen of Amplification. The report contains a thorough set of “better practices” for covering fascists that seek to prevent well-meaning journalists from propagating fascist propaganda in their work. It’s packed with research-backed insights, and it’s a good read to boot.
“You Can’t Punch Every Nazi.” This zine, referenced earlier in this guide, is helpful for getting a grasp on the basics of how fascists talk and why. The framing is oriented somewhat for activists, but the content is helpful to journalists who need or want to brush up on the basics of how fascists present themselves, and how to talk to fascists without doing them any favors.
Local antifascist researchers. There are a number of community-based antifascist organizations that operate anonymously but have an online presence. Anonymous antifascist activists will sometimes speak to the press, despite popular belief. Some antifascist researchers maintain blogs, which typically contain information as to the whereabouts of local fascists and antifascist organizing and activism.
Here is a brief tip sheet of “Do’s” (and one “Don’t”!) to keep in mind when covering the far right:
- Remember that fascists always have an ulterior motive and very often lie or otherwise manipulate the truth and report accordingly.
- Remember that fascists are a real threat—there’s a tendency in the media to underplay to the threat of fascism (sometimes reporters and pundits will say that there aren’t really that many fascists, for example). As journalists, we have a responsibility to the victims of fascism and to the general public to be honest about the fascist threat.
- Focus on victims of fascism and those fighting back against fascism, rather than the fascists themselves as much as possible. The idea is to expose fascists for what they are, and to highlight the human consequences of fascism.
- When in doubt, reach out. There are many antifascist experts on fascism who are eager to speak to the press for comment or on background. If you aren’t familiar with the history of fascism, are newer to covering these issues, or just haven’t closely studied the issues outside of a journalistic context, you’re better off reaching out to people whose views are more roundly informed by experience and research.
Tips for photojournalists:
- Get out of the way and listen to your subjects. Protests are often sites of militant resistance. They’re not photo ops. What happens at these actions is informed by community trauma, healing, and efforts to build more just societies. Be respectful of how activists are occupying space.
- Ask for consent before taking portraits of individual subjects. And when someone tells you “no,” listen to them. Antifascist and anti-racist activists don’t just shove cameras away, unless you’re not respecting when they tell you to stop.
- Consider your positionality in the space. Photojournalists play a role in the dissemination of protest narratives and must be mindful of power dynamics when determining what to photograph and how you frame it.
- Antifascist activists suggest to broaden the focus of your photographs and connect one day’s actions to a larger story of systemic and institutional transgressions. “Focus on police brutality and coordination with the far-right,” ASH suggested. “Show the care and compassion anti-racists and anti-fascists have for each other and the communities we gather in.” We hold power in the stories we choose to tell and highlight.
//EXAMPLES OF STRONG COVERAGE//
“Police investigating report of white nationalist stickers along South Side Irish St. Patrick's Day Parade route” in the Chicago Tribune.
This article is a good example of how to cover white nationalist flyering or sticker campaigns, if you absolutely have to. The reporter did not mention the group by name, but described its ideology and association to deadly fascist violence, including in Charlottesville, Va. The reporter also did not include images of the stickers in the report.
“A Most American Terrorist: The Making of Dylann Roof” in GQ.
Rachel Kaadzi Ghansah won the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing for this remarkable longform about the fascist Dylann Roof, who murdered 9 people at the historically Black Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in June of 2015. The feature takes a long and carefully considered look at how Roof came to be the person who committed a mass murder as part of a fascist “race war,” exposing the many ways that our society and government has failed to thwart violent racism.
“‘This is evil at work’: how should a small town react to neo-Nazis?” in the Guardian.
Writer and journalist Jason Wilson focused on one small Oregon town’s resistance in this reported feature. The article emphasizes the ways in which a town is fighting back against fascism, focusing both on the community impacts of the fascist threat and how people are resisting it.
//WEAK COVERAGE//
“My weekend with white nationalists” in The Outline.
There are many problems with infiltrating far-right groups to gain access to them as a journalist. For one, if you believe in protecting your sources, you risk helping fascists remain anonymous by not publishing their internal conversations, much like this reporter. We should protect our sources, of course, but maybe should steer clear of working with fascists. Instead, we recommend developing sources who can provide you with leaked chat logs, or searching through Unicorn Riot’s extensive database. Many journalists have written much stronger reports about fascist groups’ internal workings this way. This article also sensationalizes the process of gaining access to fascists, who are and should be treated as dangerous.
“White Supremacists Increasingly Using Public Banners” in the New York Times.
This report focuses only on the number of flyers and banners that fascist groups post in their communities, without much analysis beyond that. In the process of reporting that hate groups use banners to promote their message, this article did the same, and shared the banners of multiple fascist groups, helping them to gain national attention. Flyering campaigns and banner drops are often a strategy of hate groups who hope to attract media coverage from their activism.
“U.S. Law Enforcement Failed to See the Threat of White Nationalism. Now They Don’t Know How to Stop It” in the New York Times magazine.
While this feature addresses some of the ways that law enforcement has cooperated with far-rightists, the central argument (that law enforcement “failed to see” the threat of white nationalism) falls apart in the context of both the history of policing in the US and current activities between the racist far right and law enforcement. This report demonstrates the common theme of treating police as though they are necessarily neutral or helpful actors against the fascist threat.