Why The Times Is Taking Down Its Paywall for 3 Days

As we mark World Press Freedom Day, our international editor asks each of us to imagine what would happen around the world if journalists, and the public, were not watching.

By

May 2, 2019

Some years back , when I was a correspondent in the Middle East, I had occasion to witness a peaceful uprising in a Persian Gulf nation.

It was an exhilarating moment. Tens of thousands of people poured into the street chanting for an end to corruption, their mood buoyant as they expressed the simple wish for a better future.

Government forces responded with gunfire.

I am now The New York Times’s international editor, overseeing correspondents covering the world. When I was asked to write about World Press Freedom Day — a United Nations invention that once seemed like a nice acknowledgment and now feels more important than ever — my thoughts returned to that afternoon when the gunfire broke out.

After the shooting was over, grieving families pulled me into a morgue. They wanted a witness.

Three bodies riddled with buckshot were laid out on cold metal tables, and one young man, very much alive, was leaning over his dead brother, gently caressing his face, kissing his cheeks, crying.

I will never forget the image of their hands intertwined, one yellow and cold, the other trembling.

The government tried to do what governments always try to do: change the narrative. It said its forces had been fighting terrorists.

But I was there. I saw the police shooting at peaceful protesters. And I worked for a news organization that had sent me there to report what I saw.

What if no one were watching?

We are living at a moment in history when democratic values are under threat by authoritarian leaders. The internet, which holds such promise as a democratizing force, has been co-opted by people peddling divisive, hateful ideologies. Citizens around the world who want to speak out are under siege from their own governments.

Imagine if no one were watching.

Imagine if The Times were not able to report from Venezuela. The government there has tried to keep us out and has attacked our correspondents for their reporting because there is something it doesn’t want you to know: Infants in Venezuela are dying of malnutrition.

Imagine if we were not in Yemen, where a Saudi-led military coalition has prompted the world’s worst humanitarian disaster.

Imagine if we were not at the fence between Israel and Gaza as troops faced thousands of protesters hoping to crash through.

Imagine if we were not in Mexico to reveal how the previous government used advanced spyware to attack and undermine civil society.

Every day, journalists at The Times and other mission-driven, independent news organizations around the world work hard to hold the powerful to account. To celebrate their work and press freedom, The Times is taking down its paywall from May 3 to 5 so everyone who registers can browse as many articles as they like.

As you read today’s news, or some of the remarkable stories I mention here, consider: What if no one were watching?