Mutiny on the Bay: Investigating the Presentation of the Scott Olsen Police Assault on the Websites of San Francisco Bay Area Local Television Stations

Abstract

In the fall of 2011, the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) protests emerged, becoming a global movement. In the United States, the Occupy Oakland demonstrations witnessed instances of violence, most notably in the injury of Scott Olsen, an Occupy Oakland supporter and former U.S. Marine who was struck by a police projectile. This article investigates the presentation of the Olsen injury on the websites of five major local television stations in the San Francisco Bay area, as a way to illustrate the negative coverage of dissident social movement activists, even when they are former military veterans, a group treated respectfully in the media. In this case, Olsen’s presence created a conflict in the application of the themes and devices composing the “protest paradigm.” The findings of this study suggest the existence of a “patriotism paradigm,” a news treatment that neutralizes the credibility of individuals or groups seeking a claim to the positive associations of patriotism and military service of the post-9/11 United States, and can allow news treatments such as the “protest paradigm” to exist without being contradicted.

Keywords

social movements patriotism protest paradigm public nuisance paradigm local news online journalism

In the political culture of the United States, public protest and resistance has long been a utilized, yet controversial tactic. Eric Foner (2003) has explained that though radical values are deeply embedded in the U.S. cultural psyche, as expressed in founding documents such as the Declaration of Independence, movements aimed at affecting social change after the Revolutionary War have been historically portrayed over time as “enemies of American institutions” (p. xii). Although the authors and signatories of the Declaration of Independence are often evoked favorably in American sociopolitical discourse, contemporary eruptions of dissent are not and have not always been so well received. From the mobilizations of the civil-rights era, to the resistance to the Vietnam War, to the disruptive actions of the alter-globalization movement, and the fight waged by Black Lives Matter activists, treatment of domestic social justice political protest activities by U.S. mainstream media reveals this complication (Blue & Murphree, 2009; Friedman & Richardson, 2008; FTAA Miami Video Working Group, 2004; Gitlin, 2003; Obasogie & Newman, 2016). This often occurs through traditional descriptive or classificatory news treatments that fall under the category of the “protest paradigm” (Chan & Lee, 1984; Gitlin, 2003).

Throughout the end of 2011 and into 2012, similar dynamics were present in the reporting on the protests staged by the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement, a loosely organized activist affiliation that staged “occupations” of public and public/private spaces. These protests were executed in response to the role of banks and investment corporations in the global economic downturn that came to be known as the Great Recession (OWS, n.d.). By the beginning of 2012, many Occupy camps had been evicted in an operation coordinated by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, and carried out by multiple cooperating agencies (Wolf, 2012). However, the movement maintained a strong presence, and continued to attract the attention of state, local, and national government officials, police and intelligence agencies, and of course, the media. Beginning with the OWS protests staged from Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan, encampments emerged in solidarity and action, not only across the United States, but across the world, becoming a global movement. In the United States, a significant OWS-inspired demonstration developed in the city of Oakland in the San Francisco Bay area, maintaining momentum despite the camp’s eviction.¹ Occupy Oakland attracted significant attention, largely due to conflicts between protesters and the police during eviction attempts and crowd control, in which physical force was used, and “nonlethal” and chemical weapons were deployed on demonstrators (Bergeson, Grossberg, & Molteni, 2011; Johnson & Woodall, 2011). In one of those clashes, an Occupy Oakland supporter and former U.S. Marine, Scott Olsen, was struck by a projectile, speculated after the event to be a tear gas canister or smoke grenade, which left him in critical condition with a serious brain injury (Collins, 2011; Flock, 2011; Randewich & Kelleher, 2011).

Because of his service as a U.S. Marine, Olsen’s injuries at the hands of the police drew media attention. Following the September 11, 2001 (9/11) attacks during which the World Trade Center in New York collapsed, a wing of the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., was destroyed, and a plane crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, there was an upsurge of a nationalist-driven spirit and rhetoric of patriotism. Since then, members of the armed forces have been understood as “appreciated” for their service in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that were waged after the attacks, and receive credit and gratitude for preserving “democracy” and “freedom” at home (Gomez, 2011). The involvement in the Occupy movement of a former Marine who had served two tours in Iraq could potentially have challenged the narrative commonly expressed in the media, particularly when dissent is practiced in public spaces. Soldiers are perceived as symbols of American patriotism, and the participation of a member or former member of the armed forces in radical social justice street protest—associated with liberal or left-wing progressive ideology—has the potential to contradict common assumptions regarding the political views held by members of the military, that is, a type of patriotism that is in line with U.S. foreign policy decisions and embodies an unquestioning respect for authority, which includes the police as guardians of the public order.

After 9/11, the United States saw a rise in this particular version of patriotism and nationalism as the country came together in the face of terrorism, which was largely perceived as a common threat (Li & Brewer, 2004; McCauley, 2002). This nationalistic-patriotism has included an increased deference and respect for group leadership and norms, and a new willingness to punish those who deviate from the established boundaries and mark who and what is and is not acceptable in terms of identity, belief, and practice (Li & Brewer, 2004; McCauley, 2002). This mentality informs and composes what could be usefully labeled as a “patriotism paradigm.” Although patriotism can take a critical-constructive form in which dissent is held in esteem (Schatz, Staub, & Lavine, 1999), the nationalistic-patriotism of the post-9/11 United States is one in which everyone is encouraged to join with the common purpose of fighting terrorism in all of its forms (Li & Brewer, 2004). As a news treatment, the patriotism paradigm is not only reserved for coverage of street protest, and has been applied in other instances, such as in the case of Cindy Sheehan, who was dubbed the “Peace Mom” by the media. Sheehan’s son, Casey, was killed in action in Iraq, making her a “Gold Star Mother,” a title reserved for women whose children die in combat. As a Gold Star Mother, Sheehan used her position to criticize the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. One may expect Sheehan’s status to legitimize her positions, and shield her from attacks against her character or “loyalty” to the United States. However, due to her vocal opposition to the war in which her own son had died, Sheehan’s patriotism was questioned by members of the media for not conforming to contemporary patriotic values (Rich, 2005).

Stories such as Olsen’s are produced in this nationalistic-patriotic political culture through a media system that reinforces and justifies the rationales and practices of the culture and society from which it emerges (Fiske, 1992; Hall, 1982, 2009; Kellner, 2009). This system has been theorized as one that functions to maintain control over knowledge, society (Donohue, Tichenor, & Olien, 1973; Herman & Chomsky, 1988), and culture (Horkheimer & Adorno, 2006), and is composed of a handful of corporations that dominate media channels and platforms from newspapers, radio, television, and the World Wide Web (Bagdikian, 2000; McChesney, 2000). In the case of TV, this includes the local affiliate stations, which are expanding in reach through their Web presence, and providing information to increasingly greater numbers of people (Papper, 2011; Pew Research Center, 2015a; Rosenstiel, Mitchell, Purcell, & Rainie, 2011).

The media system, in its maintenance of knowledge and social control, works to sustain the ideological power of the political-economic cultural and social status quo, which is guided and reinforced at the contemporary moment by the twinned political-cultural rationales and practices of nationalistic-patriotism and corporate-capitalism. Scott Olsen engaged in what he saw as the common cause of fighting terrorism by joining the Marine Corps. In an interview, Olsen discussed his rationale for enlisting. At the time he signed up, he believed that there was a connection between Saddam Hussein, Al Qaeda, and the attack on the World Trade Center (Steele, 2015), a symbol of America and its power on the global market. Recalling that point in his life, he told the host, “My mindset was that I wanted to be a part of something bigger; I wanted to have a larger impact, fight against terrorism, defend our freedom” (Steele, 2015). However, after his discharge, he rethought his ideological commitments and took up an association with the anticapitalist Occupy Movement. It is the coverage of Olsen’s injury which is at the center of this project, for what it can tell us about the portrayal of political dissent in mainstream, profit-driven corporate mass media, even when the protester is someone considered a “patriot.”

Through researching the online content of the mainstream local television stations in the San Francisco Bay Area during the period of this event and its aftermath between October 26 and November 22, 2011, this article illustrates how these web outlets presented the police assault on Scott Olsen to the public. What has been found through this study suggests a “patriotism paradigm” news treatment that surfaced to bring Scott Olsen back into the protest paradigm. The “patriotism paradigm” functions to neutralize the credibility of individuals or groups seeking a claim to the positive associations of patriotism and military service of the post-9/11 United States, and in this case, allowed the protest paradigm to retain its form without being contradicted. The next section will provide the necessary background on the Occupy Movement, the Occupy Oakland encampment, Scott Olsen, and the incident leading to his injury.

A Brief History of the Occupy Movement, Occupy Oakland, and the Scott Olsen Incident

On July 13, 2011, a call to action was posted on the blog of the culture-jamming magazine Adbusters with a Twitter hashtag of #OCCUPYWALLSTREEt along with the following text: “Are you ready for a Tahrir moment? On September 17, flood into lower Manhattan, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and occupy Wall Street” (Adbusters, 2011). Starting on September 17, 2011, activists based in an encampment in Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan began a series of public protest actions aimed at drawing attention to and discussing a number of issues, among them: affordable healthcare, more humane immigration policies, ending the death penalty, disassembling the military-industrial complex, and reining in corporate greed. The protest, largely organized by the left-leaning organizations Adbusters, U.S. Day of Rage, and Anonymous (Schneider, 2011), was inspired by similar uprisings that were happening at the time around the globe, and was specifically intended to be “a fusion of Tahrir with the acampadas of Spain” (Adbusters, 2011).²

This set of actions, dubbed “Occupy Wall Street,” captured the attention of people across the United States, and worldwide, and inspired many similar actions as extensions of or in solidarity with the original occupation (Taylor, 2011). From the East Bay Area emerged Occupy Oakland, which, out of the Occupy actions across the country, was particularly noted for eruptions of brutal police violence (Rudolf, 2011). Beginning on October 10, the Occupy Oakland protesters set up in two public spaces, one camp in Frank Ogawa Park and another smaller encampment in Snow Park (Bergeson et al., 2011). Just over 2 weeks later, on October 25, in the wake of the eviction of the Occupy Oakland camp from Frank Ogawa Park the week prior, police engaged protesters attempting to reoccupy the space, using “nonlethal” and chemical weapons in their attempt to manage the crowd (Johnson & Woodall, 2011).

On October 25, after hearing about the demonstration, Scott Olsen went to downtown Oakland along with other veterans to show support for the protesters reoccupying the park (Randewich & Kelleher, 2011). On the way to the protest, Olsen was struck in the head with a projectile, suspected to have been either a gas canister or a smoke canister (Flock, 2011), which left him in critical condition with a fractured skull (Collins, 2011). Immediately following the incident, as Olsen recovered from the resulting brain injury, the Oakland Police Department was placed under investigation by the Oakland Citizen’s Police review board, to evaluate “protesters” allegations that Scott was shot with a tear gas canister or other projectile fired by police” (Bayard, 2011). In 2014, a lawsuit was settled with the City of Oakland paying Olsen US$4.5 million for the injuries he sustained from the police projectile which was determined to be a beanbag that was indiscriminately shot into the crowd (Fernandez, 2014; Winston, 2014).³

Literature Review: The Presentation of Protest in the U.S. Media

Since the late 1960s, coverage of social justice movements, activists, and protests by media outlets has not been particularly complimentary. News reporting has framed protesters and protests, particularly on the radical left, in a manner which represents the events and activists in ways likely not preferred by the respective social movements and their members (Ashley & Olson, 1996; Baylor, 1998; Di Cicco, 2010; Gitlin, 2003). With the rise of the opposition to liberal policies and leadership during the tenure of the Obama administration, conservative activists have also faced hostile representation in the media. For instance, in the ideologically divided U.S. cable news environment, the Tea Party received substantial attention. In that reporting, the movement was scrutinized the most by the liberal-leaning MSNBC, and the least on the conservative-oriented Fox News Channel (Weaver & Scacco, 2013). A range of studies has been conducted in an attempt to understand how activists and protests are covered. In this section, I will discuss previous research on media coverage of social justice movement protests, primarily related to the United States, to provide context for my analysis. A foundational concept for researchers and critics assessing news frames in relation to activism is the “protest paradigm,” coined by Chan and Lee (1984), who were building upon Gitlin’s (2003) earlier investigation of the New York Times’ 1965 coverage of the civil rights and antiwar organization, Students for a Democratic Society.

As scholars have noted, protest paradigm themes and devices trivialize the ways activists dress and talk, position social justice movements as the polar counterparts to extreme right-wing populist groups, emphasize internal dissent within movements and organizations, and marginalize protesters and their actions as unrepresentative or deviant by highlighting violence or the presence of ideological positions falling outside of the mainstream (Chan & Lee, 1984; Gitlin, 2003; Hertog & McLeod, 1995). These positions include communism, anarchism, political Islam (Chan & Lee, 1984; Gitlin, 2003; Hertog & McLeod, 1995; Mullen, 2009), and those strongly criticizing the police, such as the messages of the Black Lives Matter movement (Obasogie & Newman, 2016). Some of the news bias associated with these paradigms is also attributable to traditional news assumptions made in the process of constructing stories. This bias tends toward highlighting personal stories, emphasizing conflict, disorder, and authority, and covering dissent as deviant, similar to crime reporting (Bennett, 2003; Gitlin, 2003). The result has been termed a “description bias” in which protests are framed in terms of dramatic episodes, such as the presence of counterdemonstrators, arrests, or violence rather than forms of thematic coverage that are focused largely on the underlying structural conditions demonstrators are trying to address (Oliver & Maney, 2000; Oliver & Myers, 1999; Smith, McCarthy, McPhail, & Augustyn, 2001).

Lee (2014) has pointed out the protest paradigm should be considered a consequence of variables that when present, trigger the “social control function of the mainstream media” (p. 2740) and produce the description biases noted above. As found in previous studies, “radicalism” is the primary triggering condition (Lee, 2014, p. 2740), which may explain Weaver and Scacco’s (2013) detection of the protest paradigm in MSNBC’s left-driven portrayal of the Tea Party as a part of the radical far-right. Looking to theorize descriptors that work alongside those of the protest paradigm, Di Cicco (2010) developed what he calls the “public nuisance paradigm,” which focuses on the idea of protest in itself rather than criticizing the protesters and their actions. The three themes associated with this view include protests as bothersome, “impotent,” and unpatriotic, which allow journalists to highlight “politically deviant protesters generally” (Di Cicco, 2010, p. 138). It should be noted here that the protest paradigm, the public nuisance paradigm, traditional news treatments, and the description biases discussed above all work to accomplish the same goal in their portrayal of activists and what they do, and they exist together in the overlapping of their themes and devices.

In studying how protests are covered, researchers recognize that political processes, actors, and causes, and news media outlets and practices interdependently emerge within particular social and cultural moments in history, and in local, national, and international contexts (McCarthy, McPhail, & Smith, 1996; Oliver & Maney, 2000; Oliver & Myers, 1999; Smith et al., 2001; Wittebols, 1996). These conditions have been illustrated in studies on how news media have covered a range of protest activities and actors in specific places during particular historic times. For example, scholars have looked at the similarities and differences in mainstream and alternative media reporting on anarchist activism in Minneapolis during the late 1980s (Hertog & McLeod, 1995); the coverage of protests in Washington, D.C., by The Washington Post, The New York Times, and CBS, ABC, and NBC during 1982 and 1991 (Smith et al., 2001; McCarthy et al., 1996); the differences in U.S. and Canadian coverage of protests between 1989 and 1992 (Wittebols, 1996); police records and local newspaper coverage in Madison, Wisconsin in the mid-1990s (Oliver & Maney, 2000; Oliver & Myers, 1999); and the reshaping of dominant media narratives by community organizers responding to favorable coverage in The Boston Globe and The Boston Herald from 1999 to 2001 on the expansion of Boston’s Logan Airport (Marchi, 2005). In a similar vein, this study is about the reporting of protest surfacing in a particular sociocultural and historical context. Oakland, California is a city with a history and tradition of ongoing activism and antiauthoritarianism (Mahler, 2012). For example, the events and the resulting coverage of the Scott Olsen police assault emerged from that locale in the wake of civil unrest related to the 2009 point-blank shooting of an unarmed man named Oscar Grant, by a Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer, which potentially primed the Bay Area media to privilege themes and devices such as those stressing authority and disorder among other standard news treatments.

As dissent is a significant part of American political culture (Foner, 2003; Zinn, 1995), it is important to study the way media treat protest (as a legitimate practice or not). This is relevant to understanding the democratic process in the United States, as previous research has shown that news frames can affect audience perceptions of protesters and the police, the effectiveness of protest, support for the protest or the right to protest, and a protest’s newsworthiness (McLeod, 1995; McLeod & Detenber, 1999). Although activists have been able to leverage the Internet and World Wide Web to successfully organize actions (Juris, 2008), there are limits to how much protest groups are able to use new media to subvert the symbolic control of traditional channels, such as TV and print outlets (Lester & Hutchins, 2009). However, these technologies leave open the opportunity for social justice protest groups to engage in struggle for recognition and representation in contemporary democracies, making it necessary to understand this problem in all of its complexities (Cottle, 2008), such as how local TV stations report news online. The next section will briefly outline the method regarding how the data were gathered and interpreted from the five local station websites included in this project.

Method

Over its lifespan, media attention of OWS has been extensive, and ranged from news to opinion. This research effort examines the presentation of the Scott Olsen police assault at the Occupy Oakland event on October 25, in news stories archived on the websites of the five major local television broadcasters in the San Francisco Bay-area market: NBC KNTV; ABC KGO-TV; CBS station KCBS; KTVU Fox; and KRON-4, the Bay Area MyNetwork affiliate, which is a NewsCorp holding.⁴ These stations were chosen for two reasons. First, they are the largest in the San Francisco Bay area. Second, local television websites are relevant sites for research. A recent study by the Pew Research Center (2015a) found that local TV is highly visible in the continually digitizing news media environment. This is in line with earlier scholarship conducted by Papper (2011), showing that over time, the profitability of local TV websites in larger markets has been increasing, along with the number of local station websites. That same effort demonstrated that users of local TV station websites have indicated that local news is of the most interest to them (Papper, 2011). In addition, a Pew Internet and American Life Project investigation showed that respondents relied on local TV websites for local political news (Rosenstiel et al., 2011), featuring stories on topics such as the eviction of Occupy Oakland and Scott Olsen’s resulting injury at the hands of the police. As a growing and profitable platform that people turn to for information, local TV websites merit scholarly attention. Having established the relevance of local TV websites as sites for research, in this study, the presentation of the Olsen incident by the five networks is compared and contrasted to find the themes and devices associated with the protest paradigm, the public nuisance paradigm, traditional news treatments, and description biases that contextualize the reporting. This effort is intended to address two research questions:

Research Question 1 (RQ1): What themes and devices are present in the coverage of the Scott Olsen incident?

Research Question 2 (RQ2): What does the information provided to users by local TV news websites about the Scott Olsen incident indicate regarding the role of local news in shaping stories and their larger contexts, such as setting the discursive limits of dissent?

Through this analysis, I hope to contribute to research on TV news websites and to the body of theory concerned with how political protests are presented in the United States.

In gathering the data for this project, three terms were entered into the search engine of each news outlet: (a) Occupy Oakland Marine (without quotes), (b) Scott Olsen Occupy Oakland (without quotes), and (c) Scott Olsen (in quotes). The intention of using these search terms was to achieve a maximum level of exhaustion in the capturing of stories pertaining to Scott Olsen or the incident in which he was injured. Consequently, all Web stories referring to the police assault of Scott Olsen were collected from the websites of KNTV, KTVU, KGO-TV, KCBS, and KRON-4. A total of 176 news items were found, 13 from KNTV Bay Area (dated from October 27 to November 14, 2011), 14 from KGO-TV (dated from October 27 to November 13, 2011), 52 from KCBS (dated from October 26 to November 15, 2011), 95 from KTVU (dated from October 26 to November 22, 2011) and 2 from KRON-4 (October 26, 2011). All stories and news items yielded span from the first reports published related to the above search terms, to the last reports released in their respective time frames upon data collection.

The data contain news items produced in house, as well as those by external sources, such as wire services, and consist of still images, video, and text. Stories originating from external sources seemed relevant to include as they were selected by media outlets for posting on local station websites. Among these 176 items were station links to stories already collected in the sample, images taking up multiple pages of a particular story, and duplicate stories and items provided to the stations by wire services, such as the Associated Press (AP). Data collection was conducted on November 23 and 24, 2011, using Zotero to capture and organize news stories. All 176 items were analyzed, though due to redundancy in the sample, any single piece of data yielded from duplicate items or stories, such as those from the wire services, was acknowledged only once. Out of 176 items, 127 were stories or updates. Fifty-seven of those local stories or local-national updates were credited to the AP alone, with 11 more coauthored with a local affiliate. In addition, there were 17 pages of photos and captions posted on KTVU’s page, and one on the KCBS site containing 85 photos with captions, all from the AP. Meanwhile, the affiliates, alone and with local partners other than the AP, produced 58 items, which is under half of the total number of stories and relevant content.

The interpretation of these data considered the themes and devices established in previous literature on the protest paradigm (Chan & Lee, 1984; Gitlin, 2003; Hertog & McLeod, 1995; Oliver & Maney, 2000; Oliver & Myers, 1999; Smith et al., 2001) and the public nuisance paradigm (Di Cicco, 2010) as they appear in news coverage. In addition, the analysis was concerned with indicators of traditional assumptions in news treatment pointed out in past studies. These include an emphasis on drama and conflict, personalization, authority and disorder, numbers of protests, police, and arrests, and the voices of officials (Bennett, 2003; Gitlin, 2003; Oliver & Maney, 2000; Oliver & Myers, 1999). In terms of the protest paradigm, stories were analyzed for evidence of trivialization, marginalization, and polarization. Trivialization devices made light of the age, style, language, dress, actions, and/or goals of activists (Gitlin, 2003). Marginalization devices represent protesters as deviant, unrepresentative of the mainstream, or violent (Gitlin, 2003), and even emphasize sex and drug use, a recurring device which has been used to frame the OWS camp and the other occupations inspired by it (H. Roberts, Bentley, & Duell, 2011). Polarization devices represent protesters, their actions, and their ideologies as merely one side of a pair of political extremes (Gitlin, 2003), such as flagging the presence of communism or anarchism. Finally, content declaring protests as bothersome, impotent, and/or unpatriotic is indicative of the public nuisance paradigm (Di Cicco, 2010).

As the data consisted of text, still images, and video, each form was analyzed in a particular way. Text, words, and phrases were identified that indicated the themes, devices, and biases noted above. In processing still images and video, Fiske’s (2000) codes of television were employed to provide a frame.⁵ Fiske’s codes are useful in analyzing still and moving images for presentation, themes, and devices, allowing not only objective observation but also modes of interpretation for understanding the production of meaning through visual media.

Aside from themes and devices associated with the protest and public nuisance paradigms, traditional news treatments, and description biases discussed above, themes that emerged from the data were also considered. The fact that Scott Olsen is a former Marine with multiple tours of combat experience is significant, as in the post-9/11 media environment, it is uncommon for people associated with the U.S. military to be involved in left-wing political protest. It was possible that the injury of a former Marine taking part in a protest activity could have tempered the usual themes and devices deployed in the coverage of demonstrators. Journalists could have emphasized Olsen’s service, and placed his activism into context by acknowledging it within the historical tradition of American service personnel engaging in matters of social justice. Information could have been used to show Olsen’s activism and assault as a part of a broader picture. For instance, initial stories could have discussed the antiwar resistance of active duty soldiers in the U.S. army during the Vietnam era (Zeiger & Griego, 2005), or those such as John Kerry, who returned from combat only to protest the war as part of the Winter Soldier Investigation sponsored by the organization Vietnam Veterans Against the War (Vietnam Veterans Against the War Winterfilm Collective, 1972/2006).

Seeing Olsen though this lens could have cleared the ground for flipping the narrative, in which the police were portrayed as the marginalized, polarized, and trivialized group that was engaging in unpatriotic behavior by injuring an individual who fought for the democratic freedom to engage in this action in the first place. The controversy of Olsen’s participation could still have been acknowledged, while condemning police violence at the same time. This approach is not unprecedented. Looking back into media history, the standard presentation of protest and activists shifted when the press became critical of authorities after the police riot at the 1968 Chicago Democratic National Convention (Gitlin, 2003). In addition, greater ideological foundations shape the relationship between social movements and the media (Fiske, 2000; Gitlin, 2003), such as a strong belief in the free market and that military strength is a force for good, and there is sociocultural pressure to uphold those ideas as values. Within market-oriented media systems, anticapitalist messages and activities like those of the Occupy movement have been positioned as politically extreme, such as with the media’s portrayal of alter-globalization activists (FTAA Miami Video Working Group, 2004; Lewis, Ream, & Rock, 2000). By looking at this particular case, we can observe how local media participate in setting the terms of political discourse, and the limits of the protest paradigm as it is applied to activists and social justice movements in the United States.

Analysis and Findings

The analysis of the data involved accounting for every story and content item, reviewing each in text and image, and identifying occurrences that indicate the presence of one or more of the themes and devices associated with the paradigms, news treatments, and description biases discussed above. Certain specific contemporary American cultural elements were also considered, such as attitudes about the political sophistication of youth, acceptable and unacceptable protest practices and political positions, gender and family norms, racial dimensions, and the fear of politicized Islam. This section will set out the analysis and some findings, addressing each research question separately, followed by a discussion of those findings.

Research Question 1

Regarding the themes and devices that surfaced in the coverage, this research has shown that across the sample, those associated with the protest paradigm and public nuisance paradigm were present, and operated in line with the traditional assumptions in news treatments. In particular, this study found the marginalization, polarization, and trivialization devices, and the conflict, authority-disorder, and unpatriotic themes (Table 1). Often, the stories and other content contained a mixture of themes and devices, with the conflict and authority-disorder themes providing a baseline that had threaded throughout all of the reports on the incident. This became apparent immediately after the injury of Olsen, as the local TV station websites dramatically portrayed the incident in their description of the actions of the police and demonstrators, and placed an emphasis on the city’s assurances that there would be an investigation into the actions of the police (Dearen, 2011; “Oakland Chief Vows Probe,” 2011). These initial reports reflected the conflict and authority-disorder themes in their representation of the police and protesters that privileged the voice of the authorities, rather than contextualizing the events by explaining the reasons for the protests, or analyzing the conditions present at the Oakland site that contributed to the violent eruption during which Olsen was hurt.

Table 1.

Themes and Devices Found in the Coverage.

Theme or device	Example	Story, station, and date
Conflict theme	A police spokesperson is quoted about the night of the event, noting that “officers were assaulted, doused and hit with hazardous materials, and hit with large rocks and bottles.” This implied the force used on protesters, which included Olsen, was justified.	“Iraq War Veteran Suffers Skull Fracture in Occupy Oakland Violence.” KCBS. October 26, 2011.
Authority-disorder theme	Mayor Quan called for Oakland occupation pack up completely, citing public-safety concerns. The story focused on violence surrounding the encampment.	“Mayor Quan Renews Demand For ‘Occupy’ to End.” ABC KGO-TV. November 12, 2011.
Unpatriotic theme	Olsen’s discharge status is raised, along with his involvement in a website critical of the Marine Corps, and he is criticized by a “Gold Star” mother for his views and activism.	“New Details Surface From Scott Olsen’s Past.” ABC KGO-TV. November 11, 2011.
Marginalization device	Olsen’s case was discussed within the context of the Portland encampment, with protestors there described as “wearing goggles and gas masks,” and officials that highlighted drug use at the site as a cause for concern.	“Police Move in on Portland Park, Protesters Remain.” KTVU. November 13, 2011.
Polarization device	Olsen and his injury are mentioned in a story about “anarchists” shutting down the Port of Oakland though direct action that included vandalism.	“Oakland General Strike Shuts Down Port; Anarchists ‘Bent on Creating Problems.’” KCBS. November 2, 2011.
Trivialization device	A story about veterans joining the Occupy protests is accompanied by a photo of Olsen wearing a “hippy” headband.	“Veterans Join with Occupy Movements.” NBC KNTV. November 11, 2011.

Vigils and solidarity actions held on behalf of Olsen were staged over the following days and weeks in Oakland, across the United States, and abroad, such as in Tahrir Square (“The Whole World,” 2011). At the same time, stories about Scott Olsen or subjects that were related to the Oakland demonstration where he was hurt included superficial information about Olsen, such as his line of work, or police-led evictions of demonstrators from occupied spaces in numerous cities (Cooper, 2011; Dearen, 2011). As news stories were generated and posted, descriptions and categorizations began to percolate, but not in the way originally anticipated, in which Olsen and those he was around the night of the incident might have been represented by themes and devices of the protest paradigm. Instead, in the reporting of the initial incident, the posted stories in which Olsen was mentioned did not strictly pertain to the injury incident and Olsen as a person. Within the stories on these events, Olsen’s injury was mentioned, with updates on his condition and the actions of supporters. It was the portrayal of the secondary events featured in those reports, such as protests held in support of Olsen or evictions of Occupy camps in other cities across the country, and at times the rest of the world, that became subject to news treatments employing the themes and devices discussed throughout this article thus far. In particular, marginalization devices, polarization devices, trivialization devices, and the unpatriotic theme will be addressed in the following subsections.

The marginalization and polarization devices

As applied, marginalization devices served to detract from the credibility of Olsen and Occupy activists. Rather than treating Olsen with the respect usually accorded by the media to military veterans, the reporting effectively diminished Olsen’s status as a former U.S. Marine by placing safety and sanitation at the center of the stories, and occasionally included claims of drug activity and other criminal behavior allegedly perpetrated by those associated with the movement. For instance, 2 days after the evening of Olsen’s injury, occurring just prior to the eviction, a story by ABC KGO-TV detailed the condition of the park, mentioning that “20 tons of garbage and property” were removed by the city, before even addressing Olsen’s injury (Anthony, 2011). The focus on drugs and other criminal activity helped to justify the actions of the police rather than create sympathy for Olsen and the protestors. An article posted on KTVU from the AP reporting on the Occupy movement in Portland included updates on Olsen, following a description of the chaotic eviction of the protesters due to “unhealthy conditions and the encampment’s attraction of drug users and thieves” (Cooper, 2011).

Marginalization devices did not just appear in news stories or on pages dedicated to captioned images, but also on pages which contained other types of content, such as advertisements, lists of promoted stories, with some being blank bordered by words or commercial-related images. More than 30 of these pages came up in the search, all from KCBS, many containing headlines and story descriptions with images and their captions. Readers browsing these pages were exposed to headlines such as “Deadly Dog Virus Spreading at SF Occupy Encampment,” a piece accompanied by a description informing KCBS audiences of a “fatal virus” spreading among dogs that “run free at the downtown encampment.” This headline and story type was placed among other reports on different issues with less-sensational headlines. This again marked the protestors as deviant and lacking the sense or character to maintain a safe, clean environment that does not place the health and welfare of people and animals in jeopardy. Although some solemn images and descriptions of vigils and actions in support of Olsen were presented, other coverage was treated unevenly. A KNTV post pertaining to demonstrators rallying a day after the injury led with a photo depicting an angry protester wearing elbow and forearm guards, as if prepared to violently square off with security forces (“Oakland Police Action,” 2011). The photo is dark and chaotic, with the caption describing the scene, stating that protesters were shouting slogans and tearing down fences to reoccupy the space from which they had been evicted in Frank Ogawa Plaza (“Oakland Police Action,” 2011). Similar to the marginalization devices described above, representations of violent protestors with a disregard for authority were also found on CBS pages containing lists of stories. Among reports on other topics, headlines such as “Banks Targeted in Marches, Rallies During Occupy” were accompanied by images such as one that featured a man at a night protest wearing a Guy Fawkes mask and standing face to face in a confrontation with riot police.

Again, these stories and others related to occupations and actions at Occupy Oakland relayed the conflict between protesters and the authorities, relying on statements of authority figures and emphasizing violence. A notable polarization device surfaced in the focus on the presence of anarchists at an Occupy-related action, while at the same time marginalizing the activists by concentrating on their tactics, rather than their rationales. In a KCBS article posted about the general strike held by Occupy Oakland activists, which shut down the Port of Oakland, Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan was quoted about the vandalism occurring a day earlier, stating that he “believes a small group of anarchists” were responsible for vandalism against city businesses (“Occupy Oakland General Strike,” 2011). Similar reporting was seen on an ABC KGO-TV posting written by the AP (2011). This story contextualized the Occupy Oakland site and the events leading up to the eviction of the camp, including the injury of Olsen, by connecting the Occupy demonstrations to those that exploded in response to the killing of Oscar Grant at the hands of police (AP, 2011). The mention of anarchists and anarchism in the same articles discussing the port shutdown, and the association of Occupy Oakland with the violence of the Oscar Grant demonstrations, also acted as a polarization device, portraying Occupy Oakland and the movement as a whole as representative of extremists and tolerant of violence and crime. These observations are consistent with the prior research involving description biases and traditional news treatments such as standard crime reporting, and the authority-disorder theme mentioned above.

Marginalization devices that more reflected the public nuisance paradigm also surfaced in stories, particularly in the portrayal of the protests as a burden for local businesses in the Oakland area and surrounding the Port of Oakland. For example, a KTVU post described the plight of “mom-and-pop” operations in the City of Oakland, with the Oakland Chamber of Commerce President Joe Haraburda blaming “the movement” for the failure of three business deals in town due to the occupation activities (“Occupy General Strike,” 2011). A focus on larger economic consequences came up as well, but they were mainly concerned with the plight of the rank-and-file workers who reportedly lost chances to work due to the protests. A KCBS article discussing the general strike at the Port of Oakland quoted a “big rig driver, who was trapped by the crowd,” and who, being blocked by demonstrators exclaimed: “I just wanna go home. Why are they on top of my truck?” (“Occupy Oakland General Strike,” 2011). Reports such as these made it unlikely that readers would sympathize with the Occupy activists and specifically with Scott Olsen, who was portrayed as being part of this mayhem. This news treatment was compounded by trivialization devices and the “unpatriotic” theme, both of which had surfaced over time and had eventually centered directly on Olsen, and is covered in the following section.

Trivialization devices and the unpatriotic theme

Alongside marginalization devices, trivialization devices and the unpatriotic theme developed regarding Scott Olsen as a person. As mentioned above, right after he was injured, the incident itself and his status as a veteran were reported in a straightforward manner, and it was noted that Olsen did multiple tours in Iraq and was decorated for his service. In this presentation, the frame was somewhat flipped, indicated by the title of a KNTV posting, “Veterans Join With Occupy Movements: Fighting for Freedom Back at Home” (C. Roberts, 2011). This should have increased his credibility in the public eye. However, at the same time, Olsen began to be treated with a subtle trivialization device that eventually became outright criticism and a questioning of his patriotism. At first, Olsen was shown at demonstrations with the organization, Iraq Veterans Against the War, sporting long hair and a “hippy” headband (C. Roberts, 2011). This immediately set Olsen’s image apart from that of a typical U.S. Marine. A different picture of Olsen, such as one in his fatigues or dress uniform, could have served as a mitigating device that may have minimized his association with the counterculture, and consequently softened his trivialization. The most extreme example of the undermining of Olsen’s character came in the form of the unpatriotic theme. One story in particular mentioned “red flags” regarding Olsen’s service, due to Olsen’s involvement in a website meant for Marines to air their grievances about the Corps, called IHateTheMarineCorps.com. The story was accompanied with a video exposing Olsen’s discharge status from Marines as being “administrative,” which is an ambiguous categorization that is neither dishonorable nor honorable (Quintana, 2011), and can result from a range of disciplinary or behavioral issues. In that same story, a Gold Star mother who lost her son in battle criticized Olsen, calling him “out of line and pathetic” for “com[ing] home and dishonorably bash[ing] the Marines” (Quintana, 2011). It took from the day Olsen sustained his injuries on October 25 until November 11 before these stories surfaced in the mainstream media. These types of stories detracted from Olsen’s credibility as a peace activist who served two tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, and from the potential sympathy the audience may have had for him. Most importantly, the resultant framing compromised the viability of his political perspectives on issues such as income inequality, which may have carried more heft due to his revered status as a former Marine in the post-9/11 era.

Research Question 2

Along with identifying the themes and devices associated with the paradigms, description biases, and traditional news treatments which composed the coverage, this article also looked to understand what the reporting on Olsen’s injury and its aftermath could indicate about the role of local news in shaping stories and the limits of public discourse. The contents on the local TV websites about the Scott Olsen incident were produced by the local affiliates and their staff writers, and by or with reporters at the AP and local partners. As outlined above, of the 176 items yielded in the search, 127 were stories or updates. Fifty-seven were credited solely to the AP, and 11 were coproduced with a local partner, such as the Bay City News, a local wire service. There were also 102 AP-provided photos and captions posted by KTVU and KCBS, with the stations posting 17 and 85 photos, respectively. Overall, the AP produced or helped to create the majority of stories and relevant content. On the whole, the reporting on Olsen, the protest, and his injuries seems, on first glance, to be straightforward and fact oriented. Yet, the media account of the assault on Olsen is deeply embedded with the themes and devices of protest and public nuisance paradigms, shaping the immediate and local contours of Olsen’s story and those of Occupy Oakland and OWS as a larger movement. So, although users were being provided clear presentation of the assault on Scott Olsen by the Oakland Police Department, it was augmented through the placement of disparaging information about the Occupy movement with which Olsen was involved, and Olsen himself. This included content on his recovery which was laden with the themes and devices of the dominant (dramatic, negative) paradigms driving traditional treatment of news, such as controversial left-wing film maker Michael Moore’s ejection from a hospital during an attempted visit with Olsen who was not even at that facility (“Hospital to Michael Moore,” 2011). The implications of these findings will be discussed below.

Discussion

This study has aimed at illuminating the themes and devices associated with the protest and public nuisance paradigms, and highlighting the descriptive and classificatory contours of the standard news treatments applied to stories focused on Scott Olsen’s injury at the hands of the police. Even though the event itself was reported without much apparent deviation from a basic story, the frame was never truly flipped in ways that would subvert the typical manner in which social protests are portrayed in the news. This is because the incident was interwoven with sensational and marginalizing elements within the posted stories, updates, and associated content. At its worst, Olsen’s character and integrity were challenged by the scrutiny of his discharge category, regardless of the two combat tours he served and the typical rhetoric of reverence usually reserved for those who serve in the military. The presentation of the Scott Olsen story and of Olsen himself within the context of the reporting of the Occupy movement is consistent with the results from other studies, showing that, even when there is potential to disrupt hegemonic news frames, the potential is thwarted due to standard news treatments such as the protest and public nuisance paradigms. This makes sense, as scholars have established that media routines and journalistic practices are institutionalized in the construction and diffusion of news stories and narratives, and consequently reproduce and reinforce the dominant social and cultural order (Gans, 1979; Gitlin, 2003; Hallin, 1989; Tuchman, 1978).

Although across the data, all of the content was laden with themes and devices associated with the paradigms and standard news treatments discussed throughout this essay, a key finding in this study concerns the prominence of work credited to the AP, particularly regarding the discrepancies among the stations in their use of AP articles to tell the Olsen story. The AP’s locally focused content not only included news narratives, updates, images, and captions from its reporting on the Oakland encampment, but also from occupations of public and private spaces across the United States, demonstrating that the OWS movement, down to what was happening at individual camps, was indeed a national story. The presence of AP stories can be thought of in relation to a Pew Research Center (2015c) study that showed local news outlets rely heavily on the wire services to report on national politics, with only a small percentage of wire-generated stories focusing on issues of local significance, as those assignments are handled solely by in-house staff. The researchers noted that their findings may provide more insight into how resources are dedicated in an austere media environment, in which outlets are driven to outsource stories outside of the local area to the wire services (Pew Research Center, 2015c).⁶ In this case, a significant amount of stories about Olsen and the Occupy Oakland encampment were produced by the affiliates alone or with local partners, which is consistent with the findings of the Pew study. All of the stations posted AP content, or produced work in conjunction with the service, but KTVU was by far the station that outsourced the most to the AP, posting 56 stories or updates attributed to the AP or at least in part.

Without further information such as the station budget or other conditions that may drive the decisions of managers to use AP content, the reliance on the wire service by KTVU cannot be explained. What can be seen is that even with the AP’s reputation for objectivity and journalistic integrity (Baum & Groeling, 2008; Kiernan, 2003; Weaver & Scacco, 2013), it still reproduces the news treatments and biases such as those that compose the protest paradigm. As an information funnel for the national networks and wire services to feed content to the audiences of local affiliates, there are larger implications to RQ2, which place the local Bay Area television stations squarely within the hegemonic systems of knowledge, and social and cultural control that are structured and maintained in part by for-profit corporate media organizations. Military service, such as the combat experience Olsen endured, is often evoked as an act of sacrifice and patriotism which secures all of our sacred “freedoms,” including the right to protest. With the intention of policing speech privileges, this notion is frequently wielded in rhetorical expressions against liberal-leaning activists such as those associated with the Occupy movement. In this, the critics of war or neoliberal economic policies are cast as unpatriotic, ungrateful, and undeserving of the political freedom afforded to people who live in the United States. Scott Olsen’s case demonstrates that no one is insulated from the power of such discourses. Olsen risked his life in what he and many others in American society saw as a war on terrorism, yet his story is still subjected to the paradigms and biases which have surfaced in many other instances over time. The coverage as shaped by the local stations in conjunction with the wire services indicates that social justice activism, even when performed by a “hero” is illegitimate and will be scrutinized.

This case suggests the existence of a “patriotism paradigm,” which is distinct from but related to Di Cicco’s (2010) patriotic element of his “public nuisance paradigm.” When Olsen’s presence created a conflict with the protest paradigm, the patriotism paradigm acted to neutralize his credibility, and that of other individuals or groups seeking claim to the positive associations of patriotism and military service of the post-9/11 United States. From the outset, Olsen, a decorated combat veteran who enlisted to fight in what he understood as a war on terrorism, was placed squarely within the chaotic context of the Occupy movement, which dulled the significance and status of his military service. Over time, the photo of Olsen wearing long hair and a “hippy” headband surfaced, and his “administrative” Marine Corps discharge status and connection to IHateTheMarineCorps.com were revealed. As a result, Olsen, the Occupy Oakland encampment, and consequently the Occupy movement itself, was further distanced from the cultural elevation service members and veterans have enjoyed since September 11. The patriotism paradigm is specifically relevant to liberal-leaning protests, activists, and their organizations, as conservatives in the United States tend to already associate with and perform patriotic ideals based on American tenets of nationalism and free-market capitalism (Lowry, 2015). Although Coe et al. (2008) have demonstrated that the partisan U.S. media environment is hostile toward both liberals and conservatives, and Weaver and Scacco (2013) have shown that the Tea Party was subjected to the protest paradigm by American cable news networks, Di Cicco’s (2010) extensive study of 40 years of newspaper coverage found that conservative protests were less subject to being framed negatively.

Also in Di Cicco’s (2010) findings, statements concerning the patriotic value of protests were rare, and neither liberals nor conservatives were framed as unpatriotic any more than the other. This may be attributed to the ways that news media are moving away from a focus on ideology, and toward the notion that protests are to be viewed as disruptive to the rhythms of everyday life. In addition, in the United States, there is a deep cultural value placed on democratic principles, and a rhetorical protectiveness of the right to participate in politics, not only through voting, but also in the expression of dissenting opinions through activities protected by the First Amendment, such as protest (Young, 2015). However, the protest paradigm shows that there are limits to the reverence for democracy and the hesitation to represent protest as unpatriotic, particularly in its attentiveness to ideological radicals (McLeod, 1995). For conservative protests, patriotism is built-in, and in the case of the Tea Party, even the name evokes a patriotic spirit in its harkening back to what is likely the most famous act of civil disobedience in American history. Tea Party activists became known for displaying American flags, wearing tricorner hats, and espousing a version of patriotism that is centered on nationalism and the free market (Tea Party Patriots, n.d.), though, as political scientists Parker and Barreto (2013) have pointed out, the Tea Party fits squarely in to the category of a reactionary-conservative movement. It is this reactionary spirit detected in Weaver and Scacco’s (2013) findings that demonstrated how though the movement was subjected to the marginalization frame, it was potentially “inoculated” from the protest paradigm due to its mainstream orientations, even as the networks in their study reported on the activists as “idiots” and highlighted the “racism” seen at demonstrations.⁷

The reactionary character and performance of the Tea Party explains in part how the movement’s activities had “triggered” the protest paradigm (Lee, 2014) across the cable news coverage of the Tea Party (Weaver & Scacco, 2013). The Occupy movement also triggered the protest paradigm, with its radical anticapitalist philosophical threads, and tactics of public protest and occupation. These ideals and actions are perceived as hostile to the values that hold private property and the free market in high esteem, both of which are very much a part of contemporary American patriotism (Tierney, 2011). Through his participation in the OWS movement, Scott Olsen, a combat veteran, short circuited the media’s ability to apply the protest paradigm’s marginalization and polarization devices without contradictions. This required the deployment of the patriotism paradigm, a news treatment meant to specifically address such issues through scrutinizing the patriotism of activists and their respective movements and activities from positions which reflect mainstream dominant ideological views, rather than those perspectives of patriotism that take a critical-constructive view. The “patriotism paradigm” is an important phenomenon to surface in this study, and overall, the reporting not only provided a stable set of narratives and depictions of Olsen, his injuries, and the evection during which he was hurt, but also of the Occupy movement as a whole, as the themes and devices surfaced in the illustration of other Occupy-related events, camps, and activists across the country.

Conclusion

The injury of former U.S. Marine Scott Olsen, and the reporting of the incident, is a small but important part of a larger picture regarding the coverage of left-leaning protests and activists by the mainstream news media. Analyzing the stories chosen by local stations that informed the public about the Scott Olsen assault, a localized event, lends important insight into how local stations represent political protest in their particular areas. This effort, building upon the work of prior researchers, not only identified the themes and devices of the “protest” and “public nuisance” paradigms, while highlighting cues indicating traditional news assumptions, but also detected emergent negative themes concerning Scott Olsen’s background as a former U.S. Marine. The media presentation of the police assault on Scott Olsen rather than being shaped in a way to generate public sympathy for Olsen, the OWS protesters, and the larger sociopolitical reasons for the protests, instead was subject to the biases of traditional news treatments, despite Olsen’s decorated military service. In this, the case of Scott Olsen’s media coverage provides an example through which the “patriotism paradigm” can be seen emerging in its application, allowing this study to add to our knowledge of how local stations are a part of controlling or “managing” potentially challenging ideological frameworks, by maintaining them within news frames that do not disrupt the institutional power and practices that OWS activists were attempting to protest.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The author would like to acknowledge Dr. Susan Keith, Dr. Regina Marchi, and Dr. Lana Rakow for their guidance in developing this article.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biography

Sean T. Leavey is a PhD candidate in the Department of Journalism and Media Studies at Rutgers University’s School of Communication and Information. His research has looked at news media, reality television, and adult animation programs, studying relationships between media, popular culture, subjectivity, and governance. Within these areas of inquiry, his interests include, but are not limited to, structural and institutional norms, values, and practices in media; neoliberal or late-capitalist rationales and practices as related to labor, consumption, and the subject; the social and cultural contours of identity politics; and the role of social movements and activism in U.S. democracy.

References

Adbusters. (2011, July 13). #OCCUPYWALLSTREET: A shift in revolutionary tactics. Adbusters Blog. Retrieved from http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbusters-blog/occupywallstreet.html

Anthony

(2011, October 28). “Occupy” tents back up in Frank Ogawa Plaza. KGO-TV. Retrieved from http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local/east_bay&id=8408177

Ashley

Olson

(1996). Constructing reality: Print media’s framing of the women’s movement, 1966 to 1986. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 75, 263-277.

Associated Press. (2009, February 9). My Network TV will show mostly reruns in the fall. USA Today. Retrieved from http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2009-02-09-my-networktv_N.htm

Associated Press. (2011, October 30). Mayors of SF, Oakland take heat after “Occupy.” KGO-TV. Retrieved from http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local&id=8411620

Bagdikian

(2000). The media monopoly (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Beacon Press.

Baum

M. A.

Groeling

(2008). New media and the polarization of American political discourse. Political Communication, 25, 345-365.

Bayard

(2011, November 15). Scott Olsen, Occupy Oakland’s soldier for peace. The Guardian. Retrieved from http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/nov/15/scott-olsen-occupy-oakland-soldier

Baylor

(1998). Media framing of movement protest: The case of American Indian protest. The Social Science Journal, 33, 241-255.

10.

Bennett

W. L.

(2003). News: The politics of illusion. New York, NY: Longman.

11.

Bergeson

Grossberg

Molteni

(2011, November 14). Occupy Oakland campers evicted for second time in three weeks. Oakland North. Retrieved from http://oaklandnorth.net/2011/11/14/occupy-oakland-campers-evicted-for-second-time-in-three-weeks/

12.

Blue

Murphree

(2009). “Stoke the joke” and his “self-appointed white critics”: A clash of values on network television news, 1966–70. Media History, 15, 205-220.

13.

Boykoff

Laschever

(2011). The Tea Party movement, framing, and the U.S. media. Social Movement Studies, 10, 281-310.

14.

Boyle

M. P.

McCluskey

M. R.

Devanathan

Stein

S. E.

McLeod

(2004). The influence of deviance level and protest type on coverage of social protest in Wisconsin from 1960 to 1999. Mass Communication and Society, 7, 43-60.

15.

Chan

J. M.

Lee

C. C.

(1984). Journalistic paradigms on civil protests: A case study of Hong Kong. In Arno

Dissanayake

(Eds.), The news media in national and international conflict (pp. 183-202). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

16.

Coe

Tewksbury

Bond

B. J.

Drogos

K. L.

Porter

R. W.

Yahn

Zhang

(2008). Hostile news: Partisan use and perceptions of cable news programming. Journal of Communication, 58, 201-219.

17.

Collins

(2011, October 26). Iraq war vet injured during Oakland protests. MSNBC.com. Retrieved from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45054697/ns/us_news-life/t/iraq-war-vet-injured-during-oakland-protests/

18.

Cooper

J. J.

(2011, November 13). Police move in on park, protesters remain. KTVU. Retrieved from http://www.ktvu.com/ap/ap/crime/police-occupy-protesters-head-for-ore-showdown/nFcSx/

19.

Corneli

(2012, March 14). Lawyer: Scott Olsen was hit by beanbag round. The Bay Citizen. Retrieved from https://www.baycitizen.org/occupy-movement/story/lawyer-scott-olsen-was-hit-bean-bag/

20.

Cottle

(2008). Reporting demonstrations: The changing media politics of dissent. Media, Culture, & Society, 30, 853-872.

21.

Dearen

. (2011, October 28). Vigils for injured vet, police clear Tenn. protest. KTVU. Retrieved from http://www.ktvu.com/ap/ap/top-news/wall-street-protesters-hold-vigils-for-injured-vet/nFNxQ/

22.

Di Cicco

. (2010). The public nuisance paradigm: Changes in mass media coverage of political protest since the 1960s. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 87, 135-153.

23.

Donohue

G. A.

Tichenor

P. J.

Olien

C. N.

(1973). Mass media functions, knowledge and social control. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 50, 652-659.

24.

Fagan

(2012, March 14). Hurt Occupy Oakland protester was hit by beanbag. SFGate. Retrieved from http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/03/14/BAV91NL15D.DTL

25.

Fernandez

(2014, March 21). Iraq War veteran Scott Olsen reaches $4.5M settlement in Occupy Oakland bean bag case. NBC Bay Area. Retrieved from http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Iraq-War-Veteran-Scott-Olsen-Win-45M-Settlement-in-Occupy-Oakland-Beag-Bag-Case-251438961.html

26.

Fiske

(1992). British cultural studies and television. In Allen

R. C.

(Ed.), Channels of discourse reassembled: Television and contemporary criticism (2nd ed., pp. 284-326). Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

27.

Fiske

(2000). The codes of television. In Marris

Thornham

(Eds.), Media studies: A reader (2nd ed., pp. 220-230). New York: New York University Press.

28.

Flock

(2011, October 27). Iraq veteran Scott Olsen now in “fair” condition. The Washington Post. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/occupy-oakland-veteran-scott-olsens-injuries-prompt-internal-police-review/2011/10/27/gIQAVrs1LM_blog.html

29.

Foner

(2003). Forward. In McCarthy

T. P.

McMillian

(Eds.), The radical reader: A documentary history of the American radical tradition (pp. xi-xiii). New York, NY: The New Press.

30.

Friedman

B. G.

Richardson

J. D.

(2008). “A national disgrace”: Newspaper coverage of the 1963 Birmingham campaign in the South and beyond. Journalism History, 33, 224-232.

31.

FTAA Miami Video Working Group. (Ed. & Producer). (2004). The Miami model [Documentary]. USA: Indymedia.

32.

Gans

H. J.

(1979). Deciding what’s news: A study of CBS evening news, NBC nightly news, Newsweek, and Time. New York, NY: Random House.

33.

Gitlin

(2003). The whole world is watching: Mass media in the making and unmaking of the new left. Berkeley: University of California Press.

34.

Gomez

(2011, June 13). When “hero” rings hollow. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/13/when-hero-rings-hollow/

35.

Hall

(1982). The rediscovery of ideology: Return of the repressed in media studies. In Gurevitch

Bennett

Curran

Woollacott

(Eds.), Culture, society, and the media (pp. 56-90). London, England: Methuen.

36.

Hall

(2009). Encoding/decoding. In Thornham

Bassett

Marris

(Eds.), Media studies: A reader (3rd ed., pp. 28-38). New York: New York University Press.

37.

Hallin

D. C.

(1989). The uncensored war: The media and Vietnam. Berkeley: University of California Press.

38.

Herman

E. S.

Chomsky

(1988). Manufacturing consent: The political economy of the mass media. New York, NY: Pantheon Books.

39.

Hertog

J. K.

McLeod

D. M.

(1995). Anarchists wreak havoc in downtown Minneapolis: A multi-level study of media coverage of radical protest. Journalism & Communication Monographs, 151, 1-48.

40.

Horkheimer

Adorno

T. W.

(2006). The culture industry: Enlightenment as mass deception. In Durham

M. G.

Kellner

D. M.

(Eds.), Media and cultural studies: Keyworks (pp. 41-72). Malden, MA: Blackwell.

41.

Hospital to Michael Moore: Don’t try to visit Scott Olsen. (2011, October 29). KGO-TV. Retrieved from http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local/east_bay&id=8411243

42.

Johnson

Woodall

(2011, October 27). Occupy Oakland makes plans for citywide general strike. The Mercury-News. Retrieved from http://www.mercurynews.com/2011/10/27/occupy-oakland-makes-plans-for-citywide-general-strike/

43.

Juris

J. S.

(2008). Networking futures: The movements against corporate globalization. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

44.

Kellner

(2009). Toward a critical media/cultural studies. In Hammer

Kellner

(Eds.), Media/cultural studies: Critical approaches (pp. 5-24). New York, NY: Peter Lang.

45.

Kiernan

(2003). Embargoes and science news. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 80, 903-920.

46.

Lee

F. L. F.

(2014). Triggering the protest paradigm: Examining factors affecting news coverage of protests. International Journal of Communication, 8, 2725-2746.

47.

Lester

Hutchins

(2009). Power games: Environmental protest, news media and the Internet. Media, Culture & Society, 31, 579-595.

48.

Lewis

Ream

Rock

C. A.

(Directors). (2000). Breaking the spell [Documentary]. USA: PickAxe Productions.

49.

Brewer

M. B.

(2004). What does it mean to be an American? Patriotism, nationalism, and American identity after 9/11. Political Psychology, 25, 727-739.

50.

Lowry

(2015, February 24). Yes, liberals are less patriotic. National Review. Retrieved from http://www.nationalreview.com/article/414287/yes-liberals-are-less-patriotic-rich-lowry

51.

Mahler

(2012, August 1). Oakland, the last refuge of radical America. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/05/magazine/oakland-occupy-movement.html

52.

Malone

(2009, February 9). MyNetworkTV shifts from network to programming service: Netlet will try “hybrid” model next fall. Broadcasting & Cable. Retrieved from http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/173849-MyNetworkTV_Shifts_From_Network_To_Programming_Service_.php

53.

Marchi

R. M.

(2005). Reframing the runway: A case study of the impact of community organizing on news and politics. Journalism, 6, 465-485.

54.

McCarthy

J. D.

McPhail

Smith

(1996). Images of protest: Dimensions of selection bias in media coverage of Washington demonstrations, 1982 and 1991. American Sociological Review, 61, 478-499.

55.

McCauley

(2002). Psychological issues in understanding terrorism and the response to terrorism. In Stout

C. E.

(Ed.), The psychology of terrorism, vol. III: Theoretical understandings and perspectives (pp. 1-29). Westport, CT: Praeger.

56.

McChesney

R. W.

(2000). Rich media, poor democracy: Communication politics in dubious times. New York, NY: The New Press.

57.

McLeod

D. M.

(1995). Communicating deviance: The effects of television news coverage of social protest. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 39, 4-19.

58.

McLeod

D. M.

Detenber

B. H.

(1999). Framing effects of television news coverage of social protest. Journal of Communication, 49(3), 3-23.

59.

Mullen

(2009). The propaganda model after 20 years: Interview with Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky. Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture, 6(2), 12-22.

60.

Oakland chief vows probe. (2011, October 27). KNTV. Retrieved from http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Oakland-Chief-Vows-Probe-into-Protester-Injury-132682158.html

61.

Oakland police action unnerves protesters. (2011, October 27). KNTV. Retrieved from http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Oakland-Police-Action-Unnerves-Protesters-132682383.html

62.

Obasogie

O. K.

Newman

(2016). Black Lives Matter and respectability politics in local news accounts of officer-involved civilian deaths: An early empirical assessment. Wisconsin Law Review, 2016, 541-574.

63.

Occupy general strike could hurt small businesses. (2011, November 1). KTVU. Retrieved from http://www.ktvu.com/news/news/occupy-general-strike-could-hurt-small-businesses/nFScg/

64.

Occupy Oakland general strike shuts down port; anarchists “bent on creating problems.” (2011, November 2). KCBS. Retrieved from http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2011/11/02/general-strike-protesters-shut-down-port-of-oakland/

65.

Occupy Wall Street. (n.d.). About. Retrieved from http://occupywallst.org/about/

66.

Oliver

P. E.

Maney

G. M.

(2000). Political processes and local newspaper coverage of protest events: From selection bias to triadic interactions. American Journal of Sociology, 106, 463-505.

67.

Oliver

P. E.

Myers

D. J.

(1999). How events enter the public sphere: Conflict, location, and sponsorship in local newspaper coverage of events. American Journal of Sociology, 105, 38-87.

68.

Papper

(2011). Station websites continue to grow . . . but many stations still struggle with working across multiple platforms. Electronic News, 5, 60-69.

69.

Parker

C. S.

Barreto

M. A.

(2013). Change they can’t believe in: The Tea Party and reactionary politics in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

70.

Pew Research Center. (2015a). Local news in a digital age. Retrieved from http://www.journalism.org/2015/03/05/local-news-in-a-digital-age/

71.

Pew Research Center. (2015b). State of the news media 2015. Retrieved from http://www.journalism.org/files/2015/04/FINAL-STATE-OF-THE-NEWS-MEDIA1.pdf

72.

Pew Research Center. (2015c). Today’s Washington press corps more digital, specialized. Retrieved from http://www.journalism.org/2015/12/03/the-role-of-wire-services/

73.

Quintana

(2011). New details surface from Scott Olsen’s past. ABC KGO-TV San Francisco. Retrieved from http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local/east_bay&id=8429306

74.

Randewich

Kelleher

(2011, November 2). Veteran’s journey from Iraq to Oakland protests. Reuters. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/02/us-usa-wallstreet-olsen-idUSTRE7A17TB20111102

75.

Rich

(2005, August 21). The swift boating of Cindy Sheehan. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9505E3D8103EF932A1575BC0A9639C8B63&pagewanted=all

76.

Roberts

(2011, November 12). Veterans join with Occupy movements: Fighting for freedom back at home. KNTV. Retrieved from http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Veterans-Joining-Up-With-Occupy-Movements-133704108.html

77.

Roberts

Bentley

Duell

(2011, October 10). Sex and drugs on tap, who says it’s not a political partaaay? Occupy Wall Street protesters make love as well as class war. Mail Online. Retrieved from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2047168/Occupy-Wall-Street-protesters-make-love-class-war-sex-drugs-tap.html

78.

Rosenstiel

Mitchell

Purcell

Rainie

(2011, September 26). How people learn about their community. Washington, DC: Pew Research Center. Retrieved from http://pewinternet.org/~/media//Files/Reports/2011/Pew%20Knight%20Local%20News%20Report%20FINAL.pdf

79.

Rudolf

(2011, November 23). Police tactics in Occupy protests vary from crackdowns to “peaceful coexistence.” The Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/23/occupy-movement-police-tactics_n_1111163.html?ref=mostpopular

80.

Schatz

R. T.

Staub

Lavine

(1999). On the varieties of national attachment: Blind versus constructive patriotism. Political Psychology, 20, 151-174.

81.

Schneider

(2011, September 29). Occupy Wall Street: FAQ. The Nation. Retrieved from http://www.thenation.com/article/163719/occupy-wall-street-faq

82.

Smith

McCarthy

J. D.

McPhail

Augustyn

(2001). From protest to agenda building: Description bias in media coverage of protest events in Washington, D.C. Social Forces, 79, 1397-1423.

83.

Steele

(2015, June 23). Scott Olsen on militarization of the police, ISIS and Occupy Oakland. Truthout. Retrieved from http://www.truth-out.org/speakout/item/31531-scott-olsen-on-militarization-of-the-police-isis-and-occupy-oakland

84.

Taylor

(2011, October 17). Occupy Wall Street spreads worldwide. The Atlantic. Retrieved from http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2011/10/occupy-wall-street-spreads-worldwide/100171/

85.

Tea Party Patriots. (n.d.). Our core principles. Retrieved from https://www.teapartypatriots.org/ourvision/

86.

Tierney

(2011, November 14). Occupy Wall Street’s image problem. The Atlantic. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/11/occupy-wall-streets-image-problem/248421/

87.

Tuchman

(1978). Making news: A study in the construction of reality. New York, NY: Free Press.

88.

Vietnam Veterans Against the War Winterfilm Collective. (Producer). (2006). Winter soldier [Documentary]. USA: Milliarium Zero. (Original work published 1972)

89.

Weaver

D. A.

Scacco

J. M.

(2013). Revisiting the protest paradigm: The Tea Party as filtered through prime-time cable news. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 18, 61-84.

90.

The whole world is watching Occupy Oakland. (2011, October 29). KCBS. Retrieved from http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2011/10/29/the-whole-world-is-watching-occupy-oakland/

91.

Winston

(2014, March 21). Oakland to pay $4.5 million to Iraq War Vet Scott Olsen. East Bay Express. Retrieved from http://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/archives/2014/03/21/oakland-to-pay-45-million-to-iraq-war-vet-scott-olsen

92.

Wittebols

J. H.

(1996). News from the noninstitutional world: U.S. and Canadian television news coverage of social protest. Political Communication, 13, 345-361.

93.

Wolf

(2012, December 29). Revealed: How the FBI coordinated the crackdown on Occupy. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/dec/29/fbi-coordinated-crackdown-occupy

94.

Young

(2015). Dissent: The history of an American idea. New York: New York University Press.

95.

Zeiger

Griego

(Producers). (2005). Sir! No sir! [Documentary]. USA: Balcony Releasing.

96.

Zinn

(1995). A people’s history of the United States, 1492-present. New York, NY: Harper Perennial.