{"id":13380,"date":"2011-11-24T00:07:53","date_gmt":"2011-11-24T05:07:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wendybrandes.com\/blog\/?p=13380"},"modified":"2023-11-19T23:15:21","modified_gmt":"2023-11-20T04:15:21","slug":"giving-thanks-for-press-freedom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/2011\/11\/giving-thanks-for-press-freedom\/","title":{"rendered":"Giving Thanks for Press Freedom"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday’s post was about what I wore<\/a> to the annual International Press Freedom Awards Dinner<\/a> for the Committee to Protect Journalists<\/a>. As I said, the dinner honors journalists from around the world who risk their lives to report from war zones and in defiance of brutal regimes. It also raises money for CPJ’s activities: denouncing anti-press violations, providing assistance to targeted journalists, and advocating for press freedom worldwide.<\/p>\n

There are a lot of fundraising dinners in New York, but I think this is one of the most emotional. Brian Williams of NBC News<\/a>, one of the evening’s speakers, ruefully noted that the typical fundraiser doesn’t treat you to images of graphic violence during the first course. This year, we saw some of the very last pictures taken by U.K.-born Tim Hetherington <\/a>and New Yorker Chris Hondros<\/a>, photojournalists who were killed while covering the conflict in Libya<\/a> this spring. They were just two of the 41 journalists who have been killed this year<\/a>. We also saw CPJ’s new overview video about its work.<\/p>\n