The Journalist's Role In Iraq

Feelings on the media in Iraq are mixed. Most of those within the field, myself included, feel like it is the media’s duty to be there. Many members of the military feel like the media, especially those embedded with their troops, are a burden. People outside the media, many U.S. viewers, have mixed reactions – feeling that the media should be there but should stay far out of the way.

The opinion of many media members is expressed well in this quote from Sig Christenson, military reporter for the San Antonio Express-News. "All we ask for is fair play," says Christenson, currently on assignment in Iraq. "It's a pretty tough place to work, and what we reporters are doing is in the great tradition of American democracy: to tell people back home what is taking place, the good and the bad. At the end of the day, Americans should be thankful."

The media is there to inform the American people about things that they cannot see with their own eyes. It’s the same purpose that the media has at home. However, when the government puts restrictions on the media it makes it difficult for them to do their jobs. The government should not be able to tell members of the media where they can and cannot go, what they can and cannot take pictures of and what they can and cannot report on. These are violations of the First Amendment and hinder the media’s main job – to inform the people.

The stories about soldiers treating members of the media badly are horrible. The soldiers should be appreciative of the media – just as the media is appreciative of the soldiers. The media is there to tell the story of the soldier and relay it to the people back home. The media is not there to paint the soldiers in a negative light, and in my opinion has not been doing so.

Average citizens have varying opinions on the role of the media in Iraq.

“It’s nice that they’re there, but they’re not soldiers,” says Kathleen Blakeney. “They’re not necessarily qualified to be over there – it’s not necessarily the safest thing. When they get abducted or become involved in combat they don’t know what to do. It’s just not safe.”

Kathleen suggested that maybe retired soldiers or other people with military or security background should be war journalists. While this is a great idea, and probably has been implemented somewhere, I don’t know that it’s necessarily feasible. If a soldier is retired, chances are he does not want to go back into a combat situation, even if it’s not as a soldier.

In my opinion, the media has a right to be in Iraq. They have a right to report on anything and everything that they see in an unbiased, but informed manner. If they are inhibited from doing that somehow, then it is not fair. The American people depend on the media for information. If they can only get their information from the government, then they will not be getting the whole, unbiased story.


Rozen, Laura. Journalists take flak in Iraq. The Nation. 12 January, 2004. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20040112/rozen