"The vocabulary and framing you’ve used to describe protests at the University of Southern California is entirely misleading. Please adjust it accordingly, as it is a question of maintaining commonly held journalistic standards of accuracy."
April 25, 2024
To:
Nick Perry, Journalist, The Associated Press
Jim Vertuno, Journalist, The Associated Press
Acacia Coronado Journalist, The Associated Press
John Daniszewski, Standards Editor, The Associated Press
Dear Nick Perry, Jim Vertuno, and Acacia Coronado,
I am writing on behalf of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East to express a concern regarding a recent article titled “Dozens arrested on California campus after students in Texas detained as Gaza war protests persist,” published on April 24 in the Associated Press.
You write that police “peacefully” arrested student protestors. Beyond this statement being oxymoronic– as an arrest is inherently hostile– the images coming out of the University of Southern California can hardly be interpreted as “peaceful.” Is it peaceful when police officers holding batons, wearing helmets, and carrying shields march toward nonviolent students protesting genocide and proceed to arrest them?
As an agent of the state’s monopoly on violence, a police officer necessarily carries a threat of violence. To describe an arrest as “peaceful” is entirely inappropriate in any case, let alone cases in which police actions were particularly hostile and aggressive. A widely circulated video shows a police officer violently grabbing and pushing a protester at the USC campus. One video shows a protester being tackled by several police officers, pinning him against a tree and forcefully constraining his movement. Another video shows police officers ripping the students’ encampment tents out of the ground and pushing/shoving protestors to the ground.
Given these cases of violent crack-downs on protestors at USC, the framing of these arrests/protests as less “chaotic” than the ones at the University of Texas at Austin must be adjusted.
The vocabulary and framing you’ve used to describe protests at the University of Southern California is entirely misleading. Please adjust it accordingly, as it is a question of maintaining commonly held journalistic standards of accuracy.
Sincerely,
Rose Mardikian,
Media Analyst, Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East