Press freedom and the next generation

A landmark press freedom case that I require my students in Media Law and Ethics to read is “New York Times v. United States” (1971). In it, Justice Hugo Black of the U.S. Supreme Court wrote: “In the First Amendment, the Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to fulfil its essential role in our democracy. The press was to serve the governed, not the governors.”

- Atty. Ian Vincent Manticajon [e-mail]

That quote was featured in the film “The Post” (2017), which depicts the true story of journalists at The Washington Post attempting to publish the Pentagon Papers after the New York Times was barred by a federal court injunction. When, in the film, a reporter read Black’s statement aloud in the newsroom, there was a collective cheer in the classroom.

I was elated by the reaction of my students because I had thought that journalism, as our generation and those before us had known it, had lost its appeal to today’s Gen Z. Yet, judging from their active role in this year’s midterm elections and in various protests here and across Asia, there is much hope for a more vigilant society where the Fourth Estate (the media) still plays a vital role.