We are now more than a week into a community hostage crisis, where (yet again) we are being held captive to the incompetence of government officials. While some name-brand media organizations have descended on our neighborhood to report on the story, the most detailed (and interesting) information has not come from traditional print or television sources. Instead, many locals have turned to visiting “citizen journalists,” among them a guy on X with the handle @nikthehat and a YouTuber who served time in prison for wire fraud.
As you might expect, one of these groups is not welcomed into the official press conferences. Yet those unwelcomed citizen journalists may be the only ones asking tough questions and providing the most up-to-the-minute “on the street” reporting from the frontlines of the manhunt. In our evolving digital age, it might be important to think about why this is the state of journalism in 2023.
If one were only to get “news” from the local paper or a 3-minute hit on Fox29, they wouldn’t know very much as we enter day 9 of the hostage crisis. Yet one who tuned in last night to the YouTube channel of the man dubbed the Most Litigious Person Alive would have heard a long and remarkably candid conversation with a Pennsylvania state trooper and an even more illuminating conversation with a man claiming to be a drone operator directly involved in the investigation. That conversation revealed the number, model, and cost of drones being used, interesting insights about what they may know about Cavalcante’s movement and other previously unreported details about the investigation.
I don’t know if any of that reporting is accurate, and citizens should always seek multiple sources rather than blindly accept the news as it is reported, whether by the “experts” or some random guy with a phone. Nevertheless, at least these citizen journalists are actually on the ground, developing sources and live-streaming information rather than just lapping up and regurgitating the “official” narrative.
Maybe it isn’t fair to expect that level of gumshoe investigative journalism from our underfunded and dying local newspapers, but what about the super-important journalists from the Inquirer and the local television networks? Why aren’t they demanding answers from the ambitious district attorney (who wants to be elected judge in a few months) about how the prison board on which she serves allowed this to happen after an escape in the exact same manner just a few months ago?
Why aren’t they asking why our grandstanding governor hasn’t made an appearance yet, or how much this debacle is costing taxpayers? It is our money, after all. The corporate journalists have barely even challenged the inconsistencies in the ever-evolving official narrative. Aren’t these questions that any journalist interested in holding government officials accountable should be asking right now?
Some of us were reminded recently of the immense importance of the First Amendment. The Danelo Cavalcante hostage crisis demonstrates that the rights and access of citizen journalists must be defended – even those with questionable personal histories. Citizen journalists fill a serious information gap created by “corporate journalists” who prove time and again that they are unwilling to challenge most government officials – even when the incompetence or dishonesty of those officials leads to serious public consequences.
Danelo Cavalcante will probably be captured or killed soon, but the troubled state of corporate journalism is a problem that will linger well after this latest distraction passes.
Chad Williams
Birmingham Township
