COLUMBIA, Mo. — A video that showed University of Missouri protesters restricting a student photographer’s access to a public area of campus on Monday has ignited discussions about press freedom.
Tim Tai, a student photographer on freelance assignment for ESPN, was trying to take photos of a small tent city that protesters had created on a campus quad. Concerned Student 1950, an activist group that formed to push for increased awareness and action around racial issues on campus, did not want reporters near the encampment.
Protesters blocked Mr. Tai’s view and argued with him, eventually pushing him away. At one point, they chanted, “Hey hey, ho ho, reporters have got to go.”
“I am documenting this for a national news organization,” Mr. Tai told the protesters, adding that “the First Amendment protects your right to be here and mine.”
The protesters accused him of acting unethically and disregarding their requests for privacy.
“What is so hard about respecting our wishes?” one protester asked.
“Because I have a job to do,” Mr. Tai answered. That elicited a retort: “We don’t care about your job.”
As the video nears its end, the person taking the video, Mark Schierbecker, emerged from the scrum and approached a woman, later identified as an assistant professor of mass media, Melissa Click, close to the tents. When he revealed that he was a journalist, Ms. Click appeared to grab at his camera.
She then yelled, “Who wants to help me get this reporter out of here? I need some muscle over here.”
At another point in the video, Mr. Tai was also challenged by a university employee. Janna Basler, the director of Greek life and leadership on campus, approached Mr. Tai and, spreading her arms out, demanded that he “back off.”
As he tried to defend his right to be there, Ms. Basler explained, “You are infringing on what they need right now, which is to be alone.”
Ms. Basler and Ms. Click could not be reached for comment.
Months of protests over the University of Missouri administration’s response to racial tensions and other issues led the president of the university system, Timothy M. Wolfe, and the chancellor of the flagship campus in Columbia, R. Bowen Loftin, to step down on Monday. Demonstrators gathered at the heart of the campus broke into cheers with the news.
Mr. Tai said in an interview on Monday that he tried to explain that he had a right to be there.
“We’re documenting historic events with our photographs, and when people are crying and hugging when Wolfe resigns, it becomes a personal issue that people all over the country can connect with,” he said. “It’s my job to help connect those people to what’s going on.”
On Twitter, students who participated in the protest defended their decision to create a “safe space” without journalists.
There were media personnel who were very hostile toward us when we asked to have certain spaces respected.
— ConcernedStudent1950 (@CS_1950) Nov. 9, 2015
It's typically white media who don't understand the importance of respecting black spaces.
— ConcernedStudent1950 (@CS_1950) Nov. 9, 2015
If you have a problem with us wanting to have our spaces that we create respected, leave!
— ConcernedStudent1950 (@CS_1950) Nov. 9, 2015
We ask for no media in the parameters so the place where people live, fellowship, & sleep can be protected from twisted insincere narratives
— ConcernedStudent1950 (@CS_1950) Nov. 10, 2015
As the video circulated online, Mr. Tai, who won an award in June for Best Single Photograph in a college journalism awards program, received widespread support, much of it from members of the news media.
The dean of the Missouri School of Journalism, David Kurpius, said in a statement on Tuesday that the school was “proud” of the way Mr. Tai handled himself.
“Tai handled himself professionally and with poise,” Mr. Kurpius said.
He also noted that Ms. Click is a faculty member of the communications department, which is separate from the journalism school. He said she holds a “courtesy appointment” with the journalism school that faculty members would take “immediate action” to review.
