New Media Rising: Laura Loomer and The Citizen Journalist
What is citizen journalism and who is Laura Loomer?
Simply, a citizen journalist is someone with a cell phone, some apps, and the Internet who investigates situations and people to capture the truth. Mainstream media has let the American people down and nature abhors a vacuum. Conservative media giant Andrew Breitbart called to action crowds of people in his speeches by reminding them that they were a sea of media to capture the lies of politicians and the complicit mainstream media. Never has there been a better time for the explosion of citizen journalism.
New York City based Laura Loomer, an independent investigative journalist is rising among the ranks of the New Media. She has a passion for what she calls, guerilla journalism and it shows. Guerilla journalism is an in-your-face type of investigative journalism, mostly done by non-mainstream reporters that a number of new media icons are bringing back. Loomer, a former under cover investigator for James O’Keefe’s Project Veritas, gained even more notoriety for storming the stage in New York’s Shakespeare in the Park’s rendition of Julius Caesar, a play depicting the assassination of a President Trump facsimile. And this landed her a prime time interview by Sean Hannity on Fox News.
Later this year Loomer waited in line for 7 hours in New York at a Hillary Clinton book signing event for “What Happened,” in order to ask Hillary on camera, what happened to her 33,000 emails, the Clinton Foundation donations for the people of Haiti, the Americans in Benghazi and much more. Most will agree that Clinton has never really answered these questions and it is the actions of citizen journalists like Loomer that convey the message that she is accountable. As secret service was escorting her out, she still had the presence of mind to ask Huma Abedin, Hillary’s sidekick, why she was still married to a pedophile, convicted sexual predator Anthony Weiner. Again, she was invited to appear on Fox Business for another nationally televised interview. The next day, the Weiners appeared in Manhattan Supreme Court for a hearing in their divorce.
Because the general public has seen Loomer’s work, she receives information from many average citizens who bear witness to source documents, videos, photos, and other evidentiary information to help in investigations. Loomer has taken citizen journalism to new heights by breaking information that contradicts what the FBI and local law enforcement have provided to the public in the Las Vegas Mandalay Bay Casino terrorist shootings. At first many in social and mainstream media mocked her initial reports but as she began expanding her reports with hard evidence, her stories are taking off. This is a demonstration of the power of the collective effort of citizen journalists and the synergy that occurs through the power of the Internet.
It’s not all for the career. When self described New York City political activist and hardcore patriot Trump supporter Jovi Val was attacked for wearing a Make America Great Again baseball cap and for supporting President Trump by getting his face slashed and nose broken, it was Loomer who appealed to the Twitter sphere for financial and emotional support for Mr. Val who underwent plastic and reconstructive surgery. Benevolence spreads through citizen journalism too.
How does a woman with a cell phone, the internet, no major news outlet to fall back on, and a Twitter account manage to get national television appearances, tons of offers from news outlets, and praise from hundreds of thousands of appreciative followers? Citizen journalism. To her credit, this firebrand wants to coach and empower others to become citizen journalists by learning her direct and assertive form of covering the issues.
Citizen journalism is dependent on the exponential reach of the Internet and social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and many others. In fact the Internet is the lifeblood of the New Media — the growing phenomenon of real time, digitally transmitted, and highly interactive communications. Apart from the fact that most social media platforms are run by liberal and socialist activists, a fair amount of conservative communication gets through.
If it weren’t for citizen journalism we may never have known that something was terribly wrong with Hillary Clinton who was captured collapsing as her crew tossed her into an SUV the morning of the 2016 tribute to the 911 terrorist attack in Manhattan by passerby Zdenek Gazda. I personally captured a near disaster at the Raleigh Durham airport in July when an emergency evacuation was called and botched by a lack of an organized process. The next day I was interviewed by the local ABC affiliate and my story went national leading to a reassessment of emergency contingency at RDU airport.
These are very exciting times. Everything is changing. People all over the world, many with little or non-traditional journalism education are becoming journalists: gatherers and disseminators of events in our world. And others with some traditional credentials are fast learning that they must adapt to a “real time” news product. I like Wikipedia’s description of Citizen Journalism:
“The concept of citizen journalism (also known as public, participatory, democratic, guerrilla or street journalism) is based upon public citizens playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing, and disseminating news and information.”
The mainstream media have lied to us and concocted propaganda for nefarious purposes. We have become skeptical of their agendas and everything they broadcast. But make no mistake, in New Media we still need to vet sources and wait for story details to play out but it’s still much better than the lying Democrat-Media Complex we had. One could make the argument that it is even more important to stay alert, be informed, and conduct background research before accepting any news offering as valid. Mainstream media in television, radio and print are dying. To the naysayers and critics sitting home on social media tearing down those who are raising this breaking phenomenon, I say adapt or die.
If you are in a situation that is breaking news or could be used to tell the truth about an event, seize the chance to capture it on your cell phone or better yet, use applications on your phone like Periscope to live stream what you are seeing.
Keep up the good work Laura. I keep telling you, your star is rising.