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In France, Only Journalists Can Film Violence

Posted by kdawson on from the possibly-intended-consequences dept.

BostonBTS sends word that the French Constitutional Council has just made it illegal to film violence unless you are a professional journalist (or to distribute a video containing violence). The law was approved exactly 16 years after amateur videographer George Holliday filmed Los Angeles police officers beating Rodney King. The Council was tidying up a body of law about offenses against the public order, and wanted to ban "happy slapping." A charitable reading would be that the lawmakers stumbled into unintended consequences. Not according to Pascal Cohet, a spokesman for French online civil liberties group Odebi: "The broad drafting of the law so as to criminalize the activities of citizen journalists unrelated to the perpetrators of violent acts is no accident, but rather a deliberate decision by the authorities, said [Cohet]. He is concerned that the law, and others still being debated, will lead to the creation of a parallel judicial system controlling the publication of information on the Internet."

6 of 531 comments (clear)

  1. Workaround by lawpoop · · Score: 4, Interesting

    So, what do you have to do in order to be considered a journalist in France?

    --
    Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
    -- Pablo Picasso
  2. Inadmissible? by bigeeTea · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I wonder if this new law makes video of crimes inadmissible in court, if it was filmed by a non-journalist.

    1. Re:Inadmissible? by Noryungi · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is an entirely different question. A video of a violent act that is broadcast over the Internet, by someone who witnessed a crime but did not act, would be considered as a "crime" (misdemeanor?) in France.

      On the other hand, evidence from video cameras, whether operated by a professional journalist or not, are considred as admissible in a court of law. If I remember well (my Law School years are far behind me...), a video is not considered as a "full" proof, since the video could have been tampered or altered. On the other hand, a video is definitely admissible, as long as the person filming had no time to react or was not an accomplice in the violence.

      The problem is, of course, that with this new decision, the Constitutional Council opens a way to prosecute people who witnessed police violence and/or abuses and then decide to broadcast/upload the video over the Internet, without going to a court or to the police first. This is clearly designed to stifle dissent and the flow of information over the Internet.

      --
      The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
  3. What We're Doing by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 5, Interesting

    To be a journalist, you should have to publish what you record. What other business does the government have in defining a journalist, except the essential operation that defines them.

    And if you don't publish, then how is it illegal to have a record of what your own senses experienced?

    Why should media corporations that officials prefer have all the privileges? Already many amateur bloggers are better than practically all the pro journalists working today.

    --

    --
    make install -not war

  4. Re:liberty by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    If France doesn't value freedom of speech as much as America, then tell my why the Annual Worldwide Press Freedom Index for 2006 rated America behind France in terms of freedom of the press?

    America has fallen sharply as Bush has stayed in office, and ranks 53rd equal in the world for freedom of the press. France is currently 35th equal. There appears to be less censorship in France than in America for media reporting. Kinda the opposite of your statement, right? But don't let that get in the way of your blind jingoism.
    Source: http://www.rsf.org/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=639

  5. Someone noticed by cdrguru · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There is a huge potential problem brewing. And almost nobody in the "online community" understands it.

    Let's say there is an altercation between a cop and a young minority person. When the dust clears, said minority person is dead. Two hours later a video shows up on YouTube showing the cop beating the person with a large club. This is picked up, played on the nightly news. Everyone in the town sees it.

    Cop is convicted because "everone knows" he did it.

    The video is later shown to be an utter fabrication by two college students looking for fame.

    Under today's law in the US, the college students can't be charged with anything. The video would never be admitted into court as evidence, but it would be fresh in the minds of all the jurors and couldn't possibly be excluded from their minds.

    We have skated pretty close to some TV stations doing this kind of thing in the past, but most know better now. They don't accept just anything. Photoshopping pictures is being done, and some people are getting caught. In the US most news organizations are aware of the problem and are somewhat sensitive about it. It probably would take a case like this to really bring it home to the "profressionals", but we are already seeing a lot of amateur content making it out that cannot be verified and is subject to all kinds of fraud.

    But "everyone" knows "seeing is believing" and so they are going to take anything that even looks real as the absolute truth.

    Perhaps France is trying to slide away from this, just a little bit? We're ripe for some real juicy stuff in the US and until it happens there isn't going to be any restriction on so-called citizen journalists putting video out that purports to show crimnal activity. And it will be impossible to keep it away from a jury, leading to instant convictions.