Peace Demonstrations around the World
an article by David Adams

There were peace demonstrations around the world on September 27, but because of the American mass media, Americans will know less about them than people in the rest of the world. As far as I could tell, the news was not carried on US television and in most newspapers. As I found on their Internet site, the New York Times buried it in the 22nd paragraph of an story called "Bush and Blair Say No Regrets Over Iraq War".

The new independent Internet news service Indymedia was late carrying the story, picking up the London story from Indymedia UK on the next day.

Jordan Times also carried a story from Associated Press. China News had its own story. Al Jazeera carried two independent stories from the largest demonstration which was in London. Despite at least 20,000 people in Trafalgar Square in London (according to police estimates), the Guardian carried no story at all.

CNN carried a story which said that the police estimate for London was only 10,000, but apparently they filed the story while the demonstration was just starting and failed to update it.

According to the Reuters story, in addition to the 20,000 in London, there were also peace demonstrations in Madrid (7000), Seoul (2000), Istanbul and Ankara (5000), Athens (2000) and Paris (3000). Other stories from BBC , Agence France Presse and Associated Press mentioned demonstrations in Vienna, Beirut, Cairo, Warsaw, Brussels, Berlin and Stockholm.

In the US, according to Indymedia, there were peace demonstrations in a number of cities, including New York City, Detroit, San Francisco and Seattle.

DISCUSSION

Question(s) related to this article:

How can we be sure to get news about peace demonstrations?


As a reader, you are invited to join in the discussion of this article based on any of the above question(s): just click on the question, read the previous comments and add a new reply. You may also enter a new discussion topic on this article - see bottom of this page.

Thematic forum(s) in which this article is being discussed:

MAKING AN EFFECTIVE PEACE MOVEMENT

LATEST READER COMMENT:

In doing the research for this report, just like the one I did earlier about the February 15 demonstrations around the world, I was struck by the fact that the mass media is being forced to be more responsive because of the presence of independent media on the Internet, like Indymedia.

But Indymedia, like CPNN, depends on volunteer labor and that requires a different attitude by people towards the news.  People need to learn to write the news and not just wait for it to be given to them by the professionals of the commercial media.  That's not easy, as you can see from the following exchange between readers and someone named Will at Indymedia.UK: "come on, Will - you can do better. Indymedia Uk is made up of volunteers ... This kind of full-on reporting is not something anyone wants to do every weekend.  Indymedia volunteers are not machines.. . ...more.

This report was posted on October 1, 2003. The moderator is Donna.

If you wish to start a new discussion topic on this article, please copy the title of this article which is Peace Demonstrations around the World and its number which is 84 and enter this information along with your discussion question and a brief text on the new topic form.

A few stories are retained on the main listings if they are considered by readers to be a priority. If you have not already done so, please take the time to check a box below: should this article be considered as a priority?