M artin L uther K ing J r .
January 11, 2017
Live-Streaming for
Political Change
c onTinued froM P age 11
honored. I’ve seen a lot of Mus-
lim activists, which is something
I’ve never seen (in Portland). The
Muslim community has been mar-
ginalized for so long; it feels like
it’s easier to be invisible, when
you’re constantly under a barrage
of social-societal attacks. I hear so
many Muslim activists coming out
and saying: “I’m so tired of being
silenced and people creating a nar-
rative of me, that’s not my own. “
Whitten shared hours of live
video on his Facebook page. He
joined the protestors by foot and
sometime zipped around to dif-
ferent areas of the city by bike to
catch different events as they hap-
pened.
So many people watched his
reporting that he couldn’t keep up
with the comments on the video
transmissions. As with most Inter-
net comment sections, there was
a sharp divide between angry and
supportive words.
Whitten says his goal was to
show events as they happened and
to clear away the bias and misin-
formation which has been a hot
button topic since the presidential
campaigns began.
“I think the work I’m doing
is super important,” he told the
Portland Observer. “We have to
continue citizen journalism. When
you are at this level, videotaping
live, it is very difficult to lie. I
hope that people continue to use
this type of recording as a source
for their information.”
Whitten interacted with protest-
ers as he live-streamed, stopping
to talk with people and give them
a platform to share their concerns
and broadcast their voice. Many
took to the streets because they
fear that the gains in civil and hu-
man rights over the last decades
are under threat
Whitten put a human face to
and opened the door for discus-
sion in a country sharply divided
by political views.
In one moment, for example,
Whitten met a small group giving
out free hugs at Pioneer Square
and he asked them, if they were
part of a group and what they
wanted to accomplish that eve-
ning. The group said they were
just there to share love and peace.
Whitten asked them, “If Donald
Trump were here, would you give
him a hug?’ Without a pause, they
said: “Yes.”
He also interviewed Trump
supporters, trying to get an under-
standing about their beliefs and
why they voted for the maverick
billionaire.
Whitten looks at his citizen
journalism as giving a bird’s
eye view on the resistance to the
Trump presidency.
“The most profound, moving
Facebook message I received af-
ter one of the protests was from a
woman who said, ‘Hey Cameron,
I’m watching from North Caroli-
na. I want you to know I stopped
watching Netflix every night, be-
cause I’m here watching your live
stream.’ The fact that I’m better
than Netflix, that’s a huge deal, a
huge honor,” Whitten said.
We must develop and
maintain the capacity to
forgive. He who is devoid of the
power to forgive is devoid of the
power to love. There is some
good in the worst of us and
some evil in the
best of us. When
we discover
this, we are less
prone to hate
our enemies.
--Martin Luther King, Jr.
2017 special edition
Page 19