Apparently, I am not the only one to have faced the wrath of protesters seeking to censor citizen journalists:

From: Norman
Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 05:07:03 EDT
To: Evan Coyne Maloney
Subject: Similar experience

Evan,

Believe it or not, Las Vegas is a fairly conservative town when it comes to politics. While other major cities had huge anti-war and anti-Bush rallies, Las Vegas at best could muster only about 100 protesters at a time. When they lined up in front of the fountains of the Bellagio with their signs and loudspeakers, the resort/casino countered by increasing the volume of the music and literally drowned them out.

Well, a few nights later a friend of mine who works at the airport called to tell me that an entire plane load of protesters had just come off of a plane at McLaren and were headed for the UNLV campus. When they got there, ANSWER met them with coffee and sandwiches.

They couldn’t find anybody in Las Vegas so they imported these ‘Instant Hippy’ (just add water!) people from New York.

They were well behaved mostly when I got there but that changed when I turned on my video camera and started scanning the crowd. An argument ensued when some of them told me that I had no right to videotape them. Like you, I countered by saying that I had every right. They surrounded me and attempted to cut me off from my pals then tried to take my camera from me.

What saved me was an unmarked Las Vegas Metro Police car nearby. The police inside came out, corralled me and placed me in the car, camera and all. They were cool and it turns out that they also videotaped the entire proceedings. Without being asked, I gave them my tape.

By the way, in case you might be interested; I asked the police who they thought funded ANSWER, and they replied that they weren’t sure exactly but that they knew that Ted Turner was a major contributor.

Norman
Las Vegas

Norman,

Thanks for writing to share your experience.

I suspect we’re not the only ones who’ve been confronted by belligerent protesters in this manner. If more and more of us start going to such events with our own cameras, I’m sure we’ll be able to show the world what these folks are really about.

Hope all is well,
Evan