Project Censored

Infobox NPO
organization_name = Project Censored
organization_
organization_motto = The News That Didn't Make the News.
organization_type = Non-Profit
foundation = 1996
location = Rohnert Park, California, USA
key_people = Peter Phillips
Director
fields = Journalism and Media
services =
num_members =
homepage = [http://www.projectcensored.org www.projectcensored.org]

Project Censored is a non-profit, sociological project of an investigative nature within the Sonoma State University Foundation. It is managed through the School of Social Sciences at the university.

According to the Project Censored official website, the organization describes itself as a media research group that "tracks the news published in independent journals and newsletters. From these, Project Censored compiles an annual list of 25 news stories of social significance that have been overlooked, under-reported or self-censored by the country's major national news media." [ cite web
url=http://www.projectcensored.org/about/index.htm
title=Project Censored Media Democracy in Action: About Us
publisher=Project Censored
date=
accessdate=2006-12-22
author= ]

Project function

Project Censored identifies and researches news stories which it believes have been underreported, mis-reported, or censored in the mainstream media. With this research, the group aims to advocate the protection of the First Amendment rights granted by the United States Constitution and freedom of information within the United States of America. The project is built around the "Sociology 435: Media Censorship" course based at the university. This course requires long hours of researching library databases. Each student is invited to develop skills of finding and researching such news stories and make full use of them for the purpose of conducting coverage reports on more than 200 under-published stories yearly. One of the goals of the project is to encourage the development of a national interconnected community-based media news service that will offer a "diversity" of news and information to local mainstream audiences through various media. Support and encouragement is provided to journalists, faculty, and student investigation of the principle objectives as stated above.

According to the group, a story covered by Project Censored should:
# contain information that the general population has a right and a need to know, but to which it has limited access.
# be timely, ongoing, and have implications for a significant number of residents of the United States of America.
# have clearly defined concepts and be backed with solid verifiable documentation.
# have been published electronically or in print, in a circulated newspaper, journal, magazine, newsletter, or similar publication by a foreign or domestic source.
# have direct connections and implications for people within the United States of America, possibly including activities US citizens are engaged in abroad.

To date, the participants number nearly 200 and include the program staff of the School of Social Sciences at Sonoma State University, its students, its faculty, research interns, community experts, funders, and volunteer judges. Major sources of funding are provided by hundreds of individual donors, Working Assets, Anita Roddick, and The Body Shop International, as well as the Office of the President, the Office of the Provost, and the School of Social Science at Sonoma State University.

Project Censored was founded in 1976 by Dr. Carl Jensen. He retired in 1996, and since then the project has been directed by Dr. Peter Phillips.

Published works

Since 1993 Project Censored has published an annual trade paperback review of the “Top 25 Censored Stories of the Year.” Features of the book include Junk Food News, comic strips by Tom Tomorrow, updates on previous top stories, essays, and interviews. The publisher is Seven Stories Press in New York. Other projects include "For the Record", a weekly radio program featuring underpublished stories, hosted by Pat Thurston.

Prominent praises

cquote2|Project Censored is one of the organizations that we should listen to, to be assured that our newspapers and our broadcasting outlets are practicing throrough and ethical journalism.|Walter Cronkite [ cite news
url=http://www.powells.com/biblio?isbn=1583226052
title=Censored 2004: The Top 25 Censored Stories
publisher=Powell's Books
date=
accessdate=2006-12-23
author= ]

Criticism

According to the editor of the "Pasadena Weekly", Project Censored suffers from a "perceived extreme left-leaning bent that editors . . . have assumed over the years in selecting, writing, and publishing its stories. . . . more than anything it has been the Project's perceived long leftward lean that has done the most damage to its overall credibility." [cite web
url=http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/36696/
title=Time Up for Project Censored?
publisher=AlterNet/Pasadena Weekly
date=2006-06-01
accessdate=2007-01-31
author=Kevin Uhrich] Although the group never explicitly takes a political stance, a majority of the stories Project Censored highlights have a leftist political slant, criticizing big business, economic inequality, damage to the environment, and the Pentagon, and misdeeds of conservative politicians, among other progressive issues; at least 20 of the "Top 25 Censored Stories of 2007" could be classified in one of these categories. [cite web
url=http://www.projectcensored.org/censored_2007/index.htm
title=Top 25 Censored Stories of 2007
publisher=Project Censored/Seven Stories Press
date=2006
accessdate=2007-04-02
author=Peter Phillips and Project Censored] Project Censored has had several well-known progressive journalists and academics on its panel of national judges, including Robert Jensen, Martin A. Lee, Michael Parenti, and Norman Solomon without any corresponding number of conservatives.

In response, Project Censored and its supporters have stated that conservatives have been invited to serve as judges each year, but have largely refused; that such right-wing topics as criticism of "big government" have been well publicized by Republicans in Congress and covered by the corporate-owned media, and so do not qualify as under-reported; and that Project Censored has in fact featured stories from "The Spotlight", a right-wing newspaper. [ cite web
url=http://www.monitor.net:16080/monitor/5-27-96/ml-unclearII.html
title=Unclear on the Concept (Part II)
publisher=Albion Monitor
date=1996-05-27
accessdate=2006-12-23
author=Mark Lowenthal ] Project Censored's work seeks to correct the bias of the mainstream media, and from their perspective, "any bias in the upper echelons of journalism looks to be skewed toward established political, economic and social power bases." [ cite news
url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/05/05/ED124842.DTL
title=Bias depends upon where you sit
publisher=San Francisco Chronicle
date=2005-05-05
accessdate=2006-12-23
author=Stephanie Salter ]

The founder of the progressive news analysis and commentary website "AlterNet" criticized Project Censored as "stuck in the past" with a "dubious selection process" that "reinforces self-marginalizing, defeatist behavior." [cite web
url=http://www.alternet.org/story/202/
title=Beyond Project Censored: It's time for a new award
publisher=AlterNet
date=2000-04-01
accessdate=2007-02-04
author=Don Hazen] It is also been criticized for reporting on stories which are arguably not "under-reported" or "censored" at all, [cite web
url=http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2000/04/projectcensored.html
title=The Unbearable Lameness of Project Censored
publisher=Mother Jones
date=2000-04-11
accessdate=2007-01-31
author=Brooke Shelby Biggs] as they have appeared in "The New York Times" and other high-profile publications. In addition, the group periodically is criticized for shoddy reporting or misrepresentation of facts, the same fallacies the group itself claims to battle. For example, Project Censored has been criticized for consistently downplaying Serbian atrocities in Bosnia and Kosovo, [ cite web
url=http://www.wpunj.edu/newpol/issue33/walls33.htm
title=How Project Censored Joined The Whitewash of Serb Atrocities
publisher=New Politics
date=2002
accessdate=2006-12-23
author=David Walls ] for exaggerating the dangers of the Cassini-Huygens space probe to Saturn, [cite web
url=http://www.albionmonitor.com/0410a/cassini.html
title=With Cassini's Orbit, Science Trumps Ignorance
publisher=Albion Monitor
date=2004-10-03
accessdate=2007-01-31
author=Lynn Cominsky, Phil Plait, and David Walls] and for giving support to 9/11 conspiracy theories. [cite web
url=http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061104/NEWS/611040304/1033/NEWS01
title=There's that other theory on 9/11: SSU hosts discredited academic who says U.S. could have planned attack
publisher=The Press Democrat
date=2006-11-04
accessdate=2007-01-28
author=Paul Payne] Some of these claims come from other progressive publications, such as "AlterNet," "Mother Jones" and "New Politics" in the examples above, that are concerned that the Project's alleged mis-reporting will give the progressive movement and its alternative media less credibility. Two progressives, professor Robert Jensen and journalist Norman Solomon, resigned from Project Censored's panel of national judges over the decision to highlight the 9/11 conspiracy theories of Steven E. Jones, a founder of Scholars for 9/11 Truth, in "Censored 2007". [ cite web
url=http://www.illinoistimes.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A6621
title="Over the Line: Two Judges Quit Project Censored to Protest 9/11 Story"
publisher="Illinois Times"
date=June 28, 2007
accessdate=2007-09-13
author=C.D. Stelzer ]

References

External links

* [http://www.projectcensored.org/ "Project Censored" Official website]
* [http://thirdworldtraveler.com/Project%20Censored/Project_Censored.html A Project Censored archive] - Censored US Foreign Policy News Stories 1976-2005
* [http://www.sfweekly.com/issues/2002-09-18/news/dogbites.html Dog Bites: Project Censored] - parody and criticism of the Project by the SF Weekly.
* [http://www.ringnebula.com/project-censored/project-censored-index.htm Project Censored 1967-2007 Index and Archive]
* [http://www.ringnebula.com/project-censored/project-censored-toc.htm Project Censored 1967-2007 TOC and Archive]