Post

How to get URL link on X (Twitter) App

On the Twitter thread, click on or icon on the bottom
Click again on or Share Via icon
Click on Copy Link to Tweet
Paste it above and click "Unroll Thread"!
More info at Twitter Help

🍉Prof. Thrasher is on summer writing hiatus 🔻

Aug 26, 2019 • 14 tweets • 13 min read • Read on X

@BernieSanders

1/x Short thread on why all journalists ought to read @BernieSanders' (very good) @CJR essay: "we do not have enough real journalism in America right now is because many outlets are being gutted by the same forces of greed that are pillaging our economy. " cjr.org/opinion/bernie…

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR 2/x For awhile, I've been saying journalists need to reckon with the fact that ***IF*** we want to practice journalism professionally and full time w the resources needed, we must create the economic conditions for journalism to exist in U.S. society

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR 3/x This means giving up the idea of "objectivity" (itself a lie) & instead embracing that journalists have a LONG history of subjectively embracing trying to create/bolster a society which they think will allow journalism to flourish.

I.E...

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR 4/x ...major journalists and news outlets have long supported the U.S. military (abroad & at home), police departments, business & industry under the naive belief that a (so-called) "free market" & American Democracy™️ were needed for a "free press" to exist.

However...

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR 5/x...this is misguided on two fronts.

1. Many journos who support the US military/police STILL cling to a fiction of objectivity. (What they really support is the status quo of a certain race/class/nationality)

2. The voracious "free market" depends on an ever weaker press

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR 6/x How can anyone argue a "free market" allows for a free press?

San Francisco is one of the densest concentrations of wealth the world has ever seen.

It's mainstream press? GUTTED.

It's alt-weekly press? GUTTED.

slate.com/culture/2015/0…

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR 7/x Press in NYC, a global center of finance, is still going but is constantly under assault.

There is no lack of capital sloshing around.

There is a lack of will for it to be shared in projects which benefit the many, such as journalism—and @BernieSanders outlines this well.

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR 8/x Journalists cannot rely upon the benevolence of oligarchs to keep the presses churning & the servers streaming; as I wrote a couple weeks ago, @nbj914 was doing wonders w @PacificStand. Patrons can—and do—pull out anytime.

https://twitter.com/thrasherxy/status/1159191570635272192

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR @nbj914 @PacificStand 9/x The Intercept, funded by a billionaire, had cut backs...at a moment when a pub based in the US and Brazil could not be in need of more, not less, robust coverage.

Journalism as a profession needs to push for the economic conditions to exist...

cjr.org/business_of_ne…

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR @nbj914 @PacificStand 10/x And why should the profession be afraid of embracing a political/econ agenda for it to exist? Many other (more nefarious) professions have no compunction about trying to create an environment in which they can survive.

Journalists already form unions, have trade groups...

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR @nbj914 @PacificStand 11/x Journalism would do well—like coal, oil & corn—to demand all POTUS candidates give a detailed plan like @BernieSanders' of how the profession will do under their administration...which would require a society w decent wages, affordable housing & breathable air FOR journos

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR @nbj914 @PacificStand 12/x As 2020 nears, if journos don't try to create a society in which they themselves (& the profession) can exist, then they themselves (& the profession) will be relegated to more consolidation, less autonomy & less freedom—as @BernieSanders outlines cjr.org/opinion/bernie…

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR @nbj914 @PacificStand 13/x Too many journalism fix schemes involve, "Let's see if we can hack/disrupt within the current, ever more dystopian, militaristic, economic horror show."

But what if such crumbs aren't enough & journalism needs...

needs...

an economically fair society in order to exist?

@BernieSanders

@BernieSanders @CJR @nbj914 @PacificStand 14/x Talked about these ideas some more in this interview with @CourthouseNews

https://twitter.com/thrasherxy/status/1166469214435237888?s=20

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

More from @thrasherxy

🍉Prof. Thrasher is on summer writing hiatus 🔻

@thrasherxy

May 12

I have been thinking through something and it won't go away. I do not in any way want to minimized the horror of Gaza. I have seen three of these solidarity encampments grow, thrive and be dismantled, and I see how they are a metaphor for life in Palestine in some ways.

Each camp is its own little world. Life is modest, and not easy, but people carve out a little world, and they make something beautiful. Jews, Christians and Muslims live together relatively peacefully, until the police or Zionists show up and create chaos and bring violence.

People share what little they have, and give one another a sense of abundance. They make little worlds out of color, language, music, dance, the sun. They share real community. But eventually, either thru deceptive negotiations or brute violence, the little world is destroyed.

Read 7 tweets

🍉Prof. Thrasher is on summer writing hiatus 🔻

@thrasherxy

May 7

Today I am meditating on two of Baldwin’s quotes about children— “For these are all our children, we will all profit by or pay for what they become” and the one below. They both mirror how I feel about students—as teachers, they are all ours to protect.

I am a college professor, and I teach and learn with (and from) adults, and I do not mean to infantilize them. But I do feel protective of them, and I am aware that all faculty have a responsibility for the wellbeing of students, whether they are on our campus or others.

https://twitter.com/lococravey/status/1787846762905878700

Thank you. I had a touching but sad exchange w a young person at DePaul, when they were having a tough moment. I asked them if they were a student there and they said kind of sheepishly no, they were a student at a community college but they wanted to join the protests.

https://twitter.com/lococravey/status/1787846762905878700

Read 8 tweets

🍉Prof. Thrasher is on summer writing hiatus 🔻

@thrasherxy

May 4

Greetings friends from Lincoln Park, Chicago and Day 5 of DePaul University’s Liberation Zone. It’s a GORGEOUS day. To counter the lies fed to you by cops, uni admins, the mainstream media, the White House & Netanyahu himself, let’s look around at what’s happening here!

This is a Catholic Vincentian school and its Christian values are being interrogated by students in many places. As you enter the Liberation Zone, there a wall (50 feet long?) of names of children killed in Gaza.

As soon as I walk in a lady asks me if I would like some lunch. I demur bc I am going to a BBQ after but I accept some coffee. The lady and I recognize each other from Day 2 and I ask her it she works here. No, she’s “just Palestinian” and here to support the students. I say

Read 10 tweets

🍉Prof. Thrasher is on summer writing hiatus 🔻

@thrasherxy

Apr 29

BREAKING: for weeks, @shahanmufti & I have worked together to co-author & gather 50 signatures for a letter demanding the New York Times commission an independent investigation of "Screams Without Words." @laurawags has the story @washingtonpost washingtonpost.com/style/media/20…

Our letter was signed by more than 50 professors of journalism and communication at more than a dozen universities across the United States and Canada. It was delivered to A. G. Sulzberger and the NYT editor of standards and can be read in full here: washingtonpost.com/documents/adc3…

As we laid out in our letter, there is a lot of precedent for this. The Times itself followed up an internal investigation of its staff reporter Jayson Blair. And @RollingStone commissioned @columbiajourn to do just this after their UVA disaster. cjr.org/investigation/…

Read 7 tweets

🍉Prof. Thrasher is on summer writing hiatus 🔻

@thrasherxy

Apr 26

No, I am not tenured. How will I account for yesterday and today and tomorrow? Will our board forgive me when I go up and let me stick around? Doesn’t matter. This is the job: to speak about important matters. And protecting our students is the only thing that matters right now.

We must speak against the genocide. We must speak about the state and corporate suppression of free speech on our campuses. And we must backup our brilliant, brave, creative and wonderful students—putting our bodies between them and uni admin or cops if we must.

This is the job. It has been disappointing, but not surprising, to see how few tenured profs show up and speak up compared to untenured and contingent faculty, grad student workers, librarians and staff. But many GOT tenure BECAUSE unis reward silence in moments like these.

Read 4 tweets

🍉Prof. Thrasher is on summer writing hiatus 🔻

@thrasherxy

Apr 25

Wrapping up my first shift as an EJP faculty support for the Northwestern Gaza Solidarity encampment. An exciting day, and I’ve never felt more connected with my students. Heading home before my shift tomorrow, but first, let me share some things about the camp.

The camp is a sight of music, political education, mutual aid and sign making. The students are experimenting with how to teach, feed each other, make art and organize together.