First Five: Standing up for the First Amendment and Austin Tice – McDowell News

But the fact that anyone can do this doesnt detract from its significance, or the risks that it might entail.

Next week, it will have been eight years since Austin Tice went missing. Austin was a Georgetown law student and former U.S. Marine Corps officer who went to Syria as a freelance journalist in 2012. He was also one of the only Western journalists on the ground while the Syrian conflict was unfolding and he made it his mission to report on the impact the conflict was having on civilians. On July 25, 2012, he posted this on his Facebook page, responding to those who told him he was crazy to try to report what was happening in Syria: We kill ourselves every day with McDonalds and alcohol and a thousand other drugs, but weve lost the sense that there actually are things out there worth dying for. Weve given away our freedoms piecemeal to robber barons, but were too complacent to do much but criticize those few who try to point out the obvious.

On Aug. 14, 2012, three days after his 31st birthday, Austin Tice was taken captive as he was preparing to travel from Daraya, near Damascus, Syria, to Beirut, Lebanon. Diverse credible sources report that he is still alive. Austins parents, who have unrelentingly advocated for his return, recently published an open letter in The Washington Posts Press Freedom Partnership newsletter that included this heartbreaking message:

Each year around Austins birthday and the date of his capture, theres a brief moment of renewed attention and media coverage. Our son is imprisoned every single day. Every single day Austin needs his colleagues in journalism to ask questions about what is being done to bring him home, to dig for answers when they meet with obfuscation and to hold U.S. government officials accountable for their actions or lack thereof.

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First Five: Standing up for the First Amendment and Austin Tice - McDowell News