Posted on

Three news outlets turned down the R. Kelly sex ‘cult’ investigation before BuzzFeed finally published it

R. Kelly has allegedly been keeping women in something like a sex cult. An investigation published last week by Chicago rock critic Jim DeRogatis, backed up by court documents and police reports as well as interviews with named sources, revealed how the young women in Kelly’s inner circle were being subjected to mental and physical abuse. It was a story from a reporter who’d been following it since 2000 — yet three news organizations ultimately passed on the piece before BuzzFeed took it on. Some cited the demise of Gawker.com, DeRogatis told Margaret Sullivan of the Washington Post:
Three separate media organizations were interested but got cold feet at the last minute, DeRogatis said. Each one, after investing months of work, backed away from the story that used named sources and documents to describe how women near Atlanta and Chicago were held as if in a cult, according Continue reading "Three news outlets turned down the R. Kelly sex ‘cult’ investigation before BuzzFeed finally published it"
Posted on

CNN’s Acosta: There’s Been an ‘Erosion of Our Freedoms in Terms of Covering the President’

CNN Senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta once again went after President Trump and the White House for holding off-camera briefings, this time warning about the “erosion” of press freedoms. Today’s briefing was off-camera, and just like on previous days, Acosta was not happy about it. He first made his feelings known on Twitter:
Posted on

CNN’s Acosta: There’s Been an ‘Erosion of Our Freedoms in Terms of Covering the President’

CNN Senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta once again went after President Trump and the White House for holding off-camera briefings, this time warning about the “erosion” of press freedoms. Today’s briefing was off-camera, and just like on previous days, Acosta was not happy about it. He first made his feelings known on Twitter:
Posted on

The “double-edged sword” faced by local and foreign female journalists in the Middle East

Baited links in emails is nothing new for users of modern technology, from journalists to ordinary people. Being hacked by individuals associated with Russian or other foreign servers is unfortunately also not uncommon. Receiving an email that accuses you of sexual escapades, on the other hand, watching your Gmail and Facebook accounts being taken over, and then having those fabricated materials used against you when you’re imprisoned by the Iranian government for being a journalist: That’s something that Yeganeh Rezaian is all too familiar with. In a new report from Harvard’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, Rezaian explores the challenges faced by local and foreign female journalists in Muslim societies in the Middle East. She draws on her own experience when she was detained for 72 nights, starting in July 2014, with 69 nights in solitary confinement, in Iran before being released on bail. She was one Continue reading "The “double-edged sword” faced by local and foreign female journalists in the Middle East"