Thread by @SiobhanFTB

I want to take a moment to talk as a journalist about the things that interfere with my ability to report. And, while with escalating authoritarianism we have to be wary of direct interference, there are softer methods of censoring that still work wonders.

A thread:

I am not a full time freelance journalist yet. I still have a day job. Most of you who followed for my journalism will see I haven't produced anything besides an op-ed in some time. There are a few reasons for that.

One, I had my stint in the hospital back in April, and even though I was discharged two weeks later I still had a lengthy convalescence during which I spent most of that time sleeping.

But the "softer" pressure that's impairing my ability to report is that the stability of my day job was called into question. I had to hunker down into emergency mode and prepare for the possibility that I might lose this job.

(Is that connected to the medical leave? I have a hunch yes, the timing is suspicious as hell, but I can't prove anything--so there's the value of your fucking labour law in a nutshell)

The government hasn't had to do anything "official" to knock this reporter out of her beat, it just had to sit back and let the threat of poverty take care of the rest. That transitions nicely into something that *does* have a more direct influence from them.

When I take the plunge into freelance reporting full time, the time I spend on a story will be very, very precious. Investigative pieces come with a pretty generous price tag, but most investigative work takes a long time to complete.

To put this in perspective, I would have to complete 5 investigative pieces a month to make the money I'm making now at my day job.

But each piece can take about 40 hours, so on an hourly rate I'm actually losing out.

Which is fine. I want to do this because I like it and I'm good at it, not because I want to get rich. 200 hours a month at a job I actually like beats 160 at a job I hate any day.

However...

The government doesn't have to storm my apartment and steal (sorry, "seize") all my shit to exert control. If I'm reporting on abuse of authority, I have to go to them for comment. All they have to do is delay how long they take to answer my queries.

For example:

https://twitter.com/KillerMartinis/status/1027326936236867585

So let's say I get iced out of my day job and try to take the plunge to make full time freelance reporting work. My specialty means for the majority of my pieces I have to contact PR people for government agencies, and often I can strengthen my case by FOIPing support docs.

If I'm done the actual legwork to prove (or at least support) the allegations of misconduct in 20 hours, that makes the per-hour value of my investigative piece considerably better. But what if the agency stonewalls my inquiries?

Suddenly that 20 hours turns into 28. I go to work on another piece because I have bills to pay. The second inquiry gets a non-reply. 36 hours now on a single piece.

Soon enough I've moved on to other work, and after the 40-hour mark I'm now shouldering a *personal expense* to try and keep the story alive.

The government doesn't have to directly antagonize me at all to achieve this.

Now imagine the story is *your* arrest. You, personally, have been arrested at an action. You are a first hand witness to procedural errors which protect your own rights. You've suffered horrible violence.

A reporter knows about this, is *actively trying to bring your story to light,* but has to face the possibility of going in the red on her monthly budget to do so.

Now me, personally? I'm responsible for myself and myself alone. I'll eat KD for a week if that's what it takes.

But think about what this means. It's no longer merely the work that needs to be done, but the personal sacrifices necessary to keep the story alive through weeks of stonewalling.

It means this kind of reporting falls exclusively on the shoulders of salaried reporters at corporate outlets

Outlets that are being systematically devoured by the capitalist class, either literally (slash-and-burn, selling off) or figuratively (by killing these stories).

It's important work. It doesn't mean I'm not going to try. But bitches gotta eat... even reporter ones.

Coppers don't have to be kicking down my door (though the way things are going I can't exactly write that off) to be fucking with me. And stonewalling is perfectly legal.

I would say a cleverer authoritarian would prefer it as a technique because it's much less likely to garner backlash but the Beltway had fuck-all to say about the attempted lifetime jailing of two journalists during the #J20Trials so maybe I'm wrong.