As a rich donor, my favorite
business plan that I am very willing to invest in is Tim Bidon’s “Overdose of
Reality.” His idea was fresh and I think there is a huge spot in the market
right now for a business that provides easy to understand information about
drug policy, drug information and current debates that are relevant to average
citizens today. I think he is really onto something by challenging the taboo of
drug use and teaching people what they need to know. It reminds me a lot of the
abortion issue today and how many feminist and activist groups decided to
simplify the facts and start a campaign to illustrate their idea that teaching
about birth control and providing it could in turn decrease the amount of
abortions, etc. Anyway, I loved his idea.
My spot of improvement would be in
his outreach. I believe that his business could be a total gamechanger in the
ways public schools teach about drugs. I remember my program in school (and
this was only 2009, 2010) used videos from the 80’s showing kids dramatically
turning down a puff of weed at a party… they weren’t realistic and because of
that, we students didn’t learn anything. It’s a waste of time trying to teach
people why they shouldn’t do something as commonplace as certain drugs. Like
Tim said, it would make more of an impact if we simply taught the effects of
drugs and the legal/political/social aspects of it, rather than discouraging it
completely and neglecting a huge part of our population.
When everyone arrived back on campus this weekend, we had no idea we'd lose one of our own during the trip home. Michael, a junior English major, was carpooling back to school with 3 other students when he swerved to avoid a deer. He sadly passed away in the accident.
Had I not seen this photo of him on The Ithacan this morning, I would not have recognized him. But the weekend before Thanksgiving break, a few friends and I were feeling spontaneous and attending a poetry reading, where Michael was one of the guest speakers.
After an exuberant introduction by his professor, Michael stood shyly by the mic and cleared his throat. From this quiet boy I'd seen around campus, came a huge, Shakespearean-esque voice and a clear passion for the artistry of sonnets. Along with the 2 other student speakers, I appreciated his thoughts and felt his vulnerability was both inspiring and intimidating. Before leaving, we gave little nods to the students and walked out of the gallery.
Had the entire student body known we would lose such a bright spot in the literary arts world, I'm sure the gallery would've been full and he would've received much more than a few nods from kids he'd never met.
This time freshman year, I lost my best friend to a car accident over Thanksgiving break and it is an impossible time for families and friends to deal with the death of someone they love. It's hard to turn around and say "well he should've done this" or "she shouldn't have done that," but those final moments don't really matter. Though the good dying young never makes sense, it does remind us of the incredible importance of taking advantage of the time you have with people, and appreciating them while you can.
Asking our friends how their lives are really going. Telling our parents we are grateful for all they do for us. Putting our phones down to talk to a new person. Staying a minute longer to thank someone for reading their poetry out loud.
A thoughtful article by The Ithaca Journal can be found here.
In class not too long ago, we discussed a website called Kickstarter, which helps people with business/project ideas to help get their footing by allowing the public to donate to their specific funds. An article published this week commends Kickstarter for its use of public funding, but criticizes the lack of ability investigative journalists would have if they were trying to do a project long-term.
In rare cases, Kickstarters get enough money to fund their projects for a while. But an average person trying to begin a project, or an investigative journalism outlet, would need more than start up money.
That's where Uncoverage comes into play!
Admittedly, Uncoverage founder Israel Mirsky will only accept serious idea pitches (sorry, Miley) and requires some journalism experiences for people who would like to start investigative projects on his new website.
And to keep journalists from going broke by simply pursuing their passion and furthering interests of the common good, Uncoverage has a payment plan that will supposedly maintain writers and other media experts' resources to help them continuously provide quality content.
This weekend I caught wind of an awesome new business start up in journalism across the world, in Holland. The headline reads: "This online journalism startup raised $1.7M in crowdfunding and you've never heard of it."
Founded by two former journalism leaders in Holland, De Correspondent offers a fresh take on news for readers who enjoy keeping up with current events. However, rather than simply regurgitate what every news outlet publishes, De Correspondent is a platform for the already news savvy to dig deeper into the issues and figure out why things are they way they are.
Take a look at the article and check out the organization for yourself!
Recently, my brothers girlfriend has been hating her job.
She shows up to work, has to listen to moody teen girls b*tch about getting their hair wet in swim classes and tolerate wildly inappropriate young boys making jokes about their genitals at every chance they get...
She's a high school phys. ed. teacher.
Don't get her wrong, she loves her employer, colleagues, and has so much school pride it's coming out of her ears. The only problem is, coaching athletic teams and conducting gym class isn't where her passion lies. For her, it's in Nutrition.
After graduating with a degree in physical education and nutrition, she got herself a comfortable job to pay for college debts, a car and a new home. But after some years on the grind, she's not sure she's happy anymore. But what can she do? She has a mortgage, loans, etc., etc. But now that she's started taking classes online to earn her masters in nutrition, she came up with a business idea.
Create a program that develops regimens to match public school's cafeteria food and eating schedule to the gym class and extracurriculars schedule. It's all worked out.. but she needs an in.
That's where websites come through! She figures that if she can build a website, she can build a following and perhaps develop her idea further, which is a great start while she's still in school. A 2009 article by Adam Westbrook lists some general check points for someone who is trying to start up their own business, not in the field of nutrition but which would help her set up her website.
Her idea has been developing over time, but a definitive niche has been found and the market research has been accomplished. Now comes the part of actually pushing through with it, which she will need inspiration for.
One person on the Internet I currently admire is Kate, 22, of Glasgow, England. While her outlets are lifestyle based, she still brings something to the table business-wise. Her blog has been kept up like clockwork and now gets sponsors and ads. But the kicker is that she isn't just a blogger. She splits her time between her blog and her own business named Nouvelle Daily, a sort of expanded version of the blog but also includes a store, among other features.
To encourage others to start websites of their own to build personal brands, Kate wrote out some of the tips she always abides by. Among them:
- Set aside blogging time. If you work during the week, you’re probably going to have to give up that extra hour in bed – take full advantage of that morning light to take photos. Make a list of what you need to photograph so you can quickly plough through it – in one of my notebooks I have a list of posts that I need to work on, and in another I have a list of items that are going in that post, so it makes things a little easier and there’s less chance of featuring the same things over and over. Spend an hour or two in the evening drafting up a couple of posts and scheduling them for the coming week, an hour here and there will make all the difference.
- Schedule your tweets using Hootsuite or something similar to save you time throughout the day – tweet the link to your new post a couple of times and any others from the week too, and keep your notebook on hand for those random lightbulb moments when you’re in Starbucks trying to find a table.
So as it turns out, American students aren't the only ones having a hard time starting their post-graduate careers. This video that has been circulating on the European Observer talks of the hardships students are facing in many countries in Europe after they graduate university.
Even with different political systems and sets of societal norms, citizens across the world still face the same problems. Echoed in one of the interviewees is the sentiment we hear in America all the time, that policy makers are simply just working to "strengthen the advantages of the already advantaged."
My food for thought on this blustery winter day: Is it true that youth today really have to curtail back their expectations of achieving the same careers their parents had? And if so, what can we do to help them achieve more?
I felt a pitter-patter in my heart yesterday when I found out that the author of my favorite books as a child had passed away at the age of 66 after a long fight with ovarian cancer.
While she authored countless other children's tales, her most famous books were about a spunky little kindergartener named Junie B. Jones. Junie B.'s misadventures through elementary school not only helped me practice reading, but was the first character most little girls could really relate to. It's fun to read about princesses and fairy tales, but Junie B. had problems that we had too: "Junie B. Jones and the Stupid Smelly Bus," "Jingle Bells, Batman Smells! (P.S. So Does May.)," Junie B. Jones has a Monster Under her Bed," and my personal favorite, "Junie B. Jones and her Big Fat Mouth."
The books are still proudly stacked in my bookshelf at home and I was sure to read them all to my younger sister every night when she was Junie B.'s age.
I understand that print novels don't sell as well anymore and that many kids resort to online entertainment now, but for me and so many others out there it would be a travesty not to teach our own children the beauty of bedtime stories and the pride of reading your first books.
Authors have guts these days, knowing that they may not get rewarded with money or fame. But as Park said in an interview with PW last year, "For 20 years I've gotten to laugh my way through my work. For me, that's a dream job."
As I've become more involved with my major and minor, it seems like everything falls more and more into place every day. The core curriculums overlap and I find myself grasping the wider concept when the week is through.
Every government agency, like the European Union, needs an ombudsman to remind administrations what they could possibly be doing wrong. Oh, journalists need that, too? A partner who has nothing to lose, to speak on behalf of the greater good?
Hmm, corporations are walking around with too much power within the media industry and they've got to be checked by journalists. Wait, governors and lobbyists work or have worked in corporations, too? And it affects the way they make their way through the legal system?
It's nice, these days, to have so much overlap in school, because it offers us more of a chance to participate in constructive discussion and to actually apply the things we've learned to our lives a little better... who knew school really worked!!
Today as I read the article, "Entrepreneurial Lessons" by Jeff Jarvis of BuzzMachine, I was reminded of a business idea competition my friend competed in last week. While it wasn't required for class, it's heavily encouraged in the business school to participate. Basically, Chad had to develop an idea, present it to the "mentors" and they would guide him in how to move the product forward. While his idea only made it a few rounds, the person who won was granted $1,000 to go towards their project.
Jarvis taught a class which participated in the same style of an entrepreneurial idea competition with the ending being prize money and mentors to help you pursue your ideas. His article, though, was based on the lessons he learned from teaching it. Here are a few things I chewed over while reading the article:
- Startups = Seduction. Which, according to Jarvis, may mean a pitch of 17 words or less. That's like a tweet! He makes an interesting point that might be giving business kids the upper hand: people won't pay attention to your idea if you don't whittle it down to it's main purpose. Without being too vague or too specific, solidifying an idea will not only keep peoples' attention but also show that you know what you're marketing.
- If you've thought of it, there's a good chance someone else has, too. So if you're going to try to start your own business, be sure that you know who you potential partners and competitors are, while learning from them and creating features that make your idea different.
- Advertisements, advertisements, advertisements. They're the part of business that we journalists love to hate. It's just that... well, when we decide to create our own start ups, we're going to have to suck it up and just hate to love them! They are a huge part of getting revenue and, on the flip side, a big part of putting your brand out there.
I think every journalist should take a look at this article, it may be 6 years old but still holds a lot of promising features about business that we communications kids may not know!
The article brings up an important point about journalism today, which is that there is never an off switch for those in the public realm. That is not to say that citizen journalists break privacy laws (although I'm sure they sometimes do...), but it reiterates the point that has been made time and time again since social media has boomed.
"We have entered new territory and the rules are not all clear," said Larry Pryor, a USC journalism professor. "You have to assume that everything is on the record. There's no getting around that anymore."
You know what though, I'm not so sure those whom run for president should be able to speak to a "closed press" group anyway. I mean, what can they say to one group that they can't say to another, when they're going to be the one running the country as a whole? Maybe "closed press" means more along the lines of no distractions... but I digress.
When it comes to politicians, I never think its a bad thing to report everything they say and do (if it helps the public getting a better understanding of the person or situation). However, when some public figures ask for something to be off the record and would like to speak candidly, I can respect that as both a journalist and an open-minded citizen. Off-the-cuff speaking can give you a more in-depth understanding of the person or event, and can guide you in a better direction in your research or writing. It also gives listeners a break from the edited and pre-written serious stuff that public figures often use and offers up a moment of real transparency.
An example of that is when a political theorist visited a university and was recorded and placed on Mother Jones after asking to speak off the record. While he didn't have a huge reputation to damage, the comment was slightly embarrassing and probably wasn't newsworthy enough to publish. Because of that, it is doubtful that he'll speak as candidly again, which is a shame.
For politicians, off the record comments like Mitt Romney's rather racist remarks in 2012 are important for the public to grasp the full image of them, given the proper context. But every so often I appreciate a nice, little, off the record tidbit, so long as it doesn't harm anyone!
Friday night, Sabrina and I headed to Dinner and Two Movies, an event put on by Ithaca College's Buzzsaw magazine, which screened two Robert Greenwald films and hosted the executive director, Jim Miller, for a Q & A session afterward.
I knew a good amount about whistleblowers from my Independent Media class this semester, but for the past year or two, I've realized that I don't know enough about drone warfare and the role my own country plays in it across the world. With some background in hand of what drones were, how they're used, and the argument for anti and pro drone use, I walked into the screening of "Unmanned: America's Drone Wars" without knowing what I'd learn.
Ok, so me crying or getting emotional during movies doesn't really hold a lot of clout because that's how I always am. But this time I wasn't just sad for the people in the movie... I was angry, at myself for not being more aware of this issue, and at my government, for being so reckless and irresponsible in the international community. A government official was cited in the documentary when talking about the positives of drones, saying that their controllers are able to see as close as a license plate number through the satellites. But rather than this being a selling point, I found this to be a scary fact when considering the number of civilian casualties that have come along with remote control warfare.
One quote from the documentary that struck a chord was when it said "Pakistan doesn't have to train suicide bombers anymore. Drones build suicide bomber factories." While there are positive aspects of keeping our soldiers safe and effectively using technology, policy makers seem to have a complete disregard for the minds of the people whose lives they are affecting. War is heavily a mind game, and in the eyes of those who we are "helping," we are the villains.
I'm appreciative that I am in a school that encourages its students to expand our knowledge when it comes to issues that are avoided in mainstream media, and I am very grateful to have been able to hear Miller answer questions after the screenings. His insight on the root of the issue reminded me not to sit idly by while our country is conducting its own form of terrorism abroad.
So as it turns out, I actually can make money mom and dad! All that time spent on YouTube hasn't been all for naught! Regardless of whether or not we journalists will end up working in our dream job (an on air reporter, a newspaper editor, a magazine writer, etc), if we try hard enough there's no saying we can't make money in another media: YouTube.
Michael Buckley, from YouTube's "What The Buck?" webisodes, described his rise to Internet stardom in a recent article by the New York Times. Buckley talks about how he started from a small salary on a TV station to a six digit paycheck based on videos from his living room.
Here's the website I found for some further information about becoming a Partner of YouTube and creating revenue from your videos: Click Here.
It's funny, there's a current subculture of YouTube stars these days, who all started the way Buckley did and picked up larger fanbases. Through their fans and social media, obviously, they've been connecting and getting together as sort of representatives of YouTube and their own little brands.
Because of their partnerships with the online medium, and due to their similar new lifestyles, these vlogging individuals collaborate ALL the time! If you spend enough time on YouTube, you'll start to see lots of familiar faces. This is one of my favorite guys who's done video blogging right:
Tyler Oakley- Just two years ago, he was spending every day making endless videos around his house by simply videotaping himself and bringing up talking points. He found some popularity online, but it wasn't until he made a video about the band One Direction during the peak of their rise to fame, that got him TONS of attention.
So that one is pretty silly, but now, a little over a year later, every person in the audience at the Staples Center for One Direction knows who he is (he also now designs and sells tee shirts like the one he's wearing)....
And yes, that booth was paid for by One Direction themselves, who he has now interviewed many times on television and online. YouTube has helped sponsor him to become a fresh face in pop culture, as one of the first people I, and many others, turn to for celebrity news and hilarious YouTube videos on a regular basis (see Drunk Pumpkin Carving...).
I'm always so happy for people like Michael Buckley and Tyler Oakley because their Internet fame definitely did not just fall into their laps. They worked on their image, consistently made videos (even when nobody was watching them) and utilized everything they knew about the Internet to connect their videos to the public. Congrats YouTubers, for being the new, quadruple-threat generation of media experts.
Last week, one of my friends posted a video on Facebook by a group called YOUTHSPEAKS, an organization that supports slam poetry competitions across the US. I was immediately sucked in to their YouTube page in awe, watching handfuls of videos and wondering how I could have brushed off this powerful style of poetry.
As I sat there, listening to these young people express themselves with such artistry and raw emotion I had to think, where does poetry fit in today's society?
After initially reading an article by Alexandra Petri of the Washington Post, I felt a little disheartened. I appreciated that she defended journalists by saying that people can say what they want about newspapers, but they'll always need news. I was saddened, however, when I read that not only are people not as "good" at poetry as they were in the past, but that nobody is even reading/writing/listening anymore.
So you can imagine my joy when I found this article by Emily Temple on Flavorwire, combating Petri's story with references of recently published poems that are in no way fading out of the spotlight. Like ballet and opera, Temple says, art forms are not dead simply because they are enjoyed by a minority.
It gives me hope for print journalism, that traditional newspapers and books will always hold a little place in people's hearts...
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Here's my favorite slam poetry video I watched from YOUTHSPEAKS, which is eerily appropriate for today...
“Doors are going to open... doors you can't even imagine exist.”
-Julie Powell
The blogging world is dynamic, eccentric and opinionated, but it is also very welcoming. With access to a computer and just an ounce of tech savvy, anyone can start writing a blog. They could start it for themselves or for a small forum, like my Independent Media class, or they could pursue an audience on a much larger scale. It's almost impossible to predict the potential popularity of one's blog, but if you can follow the basic instructions of those bloggers who came before you, there's no limit to what you can achieve in the online world.
I absolutely love blogs. I got into them right around the time my middle school starting giving us laptops to take home (they quickly found that giving preteen boys their own computers was not the best idea...).
Anyway, I remember the summer reading initiative for freshman year of high school, Freakonomics, and how intrigued I was that so many aspects of life related to economic theory.
When I found the Freakonomics blog that correlated to the book, I was hooked. From there on out, I started turning to blogs for everything from help with school to what to wear to the best movies of the month.
Blogs can be as basic or as complex as the writer decides it should, which is one of the best and worst qualities about blogging. Some are pointless, like this one about a character from Hey Arnold... but the most popular ones are meaningful and informative, like this and this.
I think the coolest part of popular blogs is that many of them started with a pre-made template on an average person's computer. All it takes is inspiration, online connections and word-of-mouth to get a blog going!
Take Julie Powell, for example. Your average, middle-aged mother, working in a cubicle, with an unfulfilled passion for something from earlier in her life. Curiosity struck and one day Julie picked up her favorite cook book and looked at it in a new light...
"So, that book was there and this simmering frustration was there and this idea that had I always wanted to write and was very frustrated as a writer—so it all came together at once. Here is my subject, here is my regimen, this is how I am going to plug writing in it—through this new bizarro thing I don't understand called a blog—and it all came together like that." Read more: http://www.oprah.com/food/Q-and-A-with-Julie-and-Julia-Author-Julie-Powell/2#ixzz2jF6kceRt
Julie began at page 1 and experimented with every recipe from Julia Child's famous "Mastering the Art of French Cooking," all while sharing each adventure on her little blog. And before she could say "Bon Appétit!" her blog was getting thousands of page views a day.
Shortly thereafter, this telemarketer-slash-mother-turned-blogger was offered a book deal, and then came the movie, starring none other than a Miss Meryl Streep and Amy Adams.
Whether or not you like Julie's writing (or cooking), there's no denying the inspiration you'll feel after reading about her climb to the top. Knowing that her blog started as a little "Julie/Julia Project" for her friends and family and turned into so much more would make any journalism kid (who, moi?) look at blogging as less of a "why" and more of a "why not?"
What have we got to lose? If it's not great, nobody will read it and it'll just fade away into Internet oblivion. But if it's good...ooooh if it's good, you could wind up as a bestseller, being played by Amy Adams in your local movie theatre.
It's pretty well-known now that everything we do on the Internet is tracked and noted, even some of the things we do without even being online. In fact- Google just released a statement about their new privacy policy and how they'll be able to offer pretty much anything you do on its mediums, to the public. (Click Here to read a criticism about it)
Anyway, what I was thinking about was, what if someday nobody can be online anonymously?
Most of the time I like being anonymous, like if I'm online shopping or downloading music and movies. And then there are times when I like people to know my name, like when I'm writing a review or using social media. But imagine- what if you couldn't be anonymous?
It would be terrible for the consumer. I mean, I really don't want companies to be able to track my purchases and browsing history to cater to me! I like knowin' I've got options, ya know? But, I was wondering, do you think cyberbullying could end? Would half of the offensive language we see online go away? I bet some of the websites that wobble over the lines of hate speech would get taken down.
I don't know, but I could see that being one good outcome for Internet users of all ages. :)
My heart aches for the children and families suffering on this memorable Monday due to the shooting at Sparks Middle School in Nevada this morning. I cannot imagine the horror felt by students, parents, teachers and friends today as they experienced this news I heard about hours later.
During my semester abroad this year, more than once I was asked by British colleagues or friends what it was like to live in a place where I was never really safe. They asked if I felt scared going to movie theatres, malls or even my own school and I couldn't really think of the right words to say. I think I was a little angry and embarrassed that the society I lived in made me feel differently than what these people did.
One night, I had the most horribly vivid nightmare of my life- about three friends and I going to a grocery store for some snacks when a guy came in and gunned everyone in the store down. It was so realistic that I had to make a long distance call to my poor mother at 4am her time!
I rethought the questions I had been asked about being in public places... and I realized I really was scared.
It was disheartening today to find bitter tweets about the Nevada school shooting, on an outlet that has typically been used to show an outpouring of neighborly love in hard times. Instead, I was witnessing in live time, a chunk of American youth say that they weren't going to pay attention to mass shootings anymore.
It's pretty sad to think teens and young adults are already becoming desensitized to violence in public places, especially those that end in deaths. I even saw a comment today that appeared totally logical, until the person said, "If we only just armed the teachers and trained anyone working with hundreds of people to defend themselves, we would be much better off."
Can you imagine a 13-year-old kid with a gun walking into a classroom full of students and a teacher pulling out another gun and shooting the child? Not that they wouldn't (because who knows) but because I don't ever, EVER, see that as working out for anybody.
This problem we're having in this country has to go back to its roots- in the US legislature and in modern society. Let's even take it baby steps! Maybe create a psych analysis to sort of screen people before letting them purchase guns. Maybe make a limit on one gun per household... maybe take gun advertisements out of the media in the same way cigarettes were! There are a billion ways to start to change the outcomes of guns getting into the wrong hands, and it seems our legislators are taking their sweet time in the grey area surrounding it all.
I suppose it'll take more than that to make people feel safe again, but something's gotta give here.
Hold on to your britches, folks. This post is gonna be a doozy.
Time and time again, big movie producers have taken historical movements, events and individuals and adapted those stories into Hollywood movies. This repetitive trend in American cinema has been both treasured and harshly critiqued throughout the years and for good reason. A famous producer taking the reigns on an autobiographical adaptation can give attention to underplayed moments in history, like "Zero Dark Thirty," directed by Kathryn Bigelow and written by Mark Boal, which shed light on the American military's long man-hunt for al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
But more often than not, Hollywood has been known to twist history for the sake of entertainment value and a heightened sense of American pride.
Take the recent award-winning historical adaptation, "Argo," directed and produced by Ben Affleck, which got heavy criticism for completely downplaying Canadian involvement in an important CIA operative. So much so, that ex-President Jimmy Carter, who was President in 1979 when said Iran Hostage Crisis occurred, spoke out against the facts presented in the film (The New Yorker)! This blog post by On Violence runs through the historical inaccuracies further, if you're as interested as I am in this topic.
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The issue of historical inaccuracies or American adaptations of real events seemed like an important discussion after watching a documentary on I.F. Stone in Indy Media last week. The film highlighted many issues that Izzy felt very strongly about, one, being that journalists should never get too close to their sources for fear of the influence it may have on a story. An example of this is the clip we saw of an NBC reporter playing tennis with the White House press secretary in the White House lawn... *sigh*
This reminded me of an issue that has conflicted me since junior year of high school, when I had an exchange student from Slovakia named Petra.
After being placed in a U.S. History class and studying the material, she said she was shocked by the difference in the way certain events were portrayed in her own European history books. The American dubbed "Vietnam War," for example, was illustrated in our books as primarily the United States military fighting against the North Vietnamese. However, in Petra's books, American ground troops were included in the re-telling, but hers had more of an international focus which reflected heavy influence by foreign troops, like those of Australia and New Zealand, as well as the sustained efforts of the South Vietnamese. Heck, my memory of learning about the War in high school is that the Vietnamese started guerrilla warfare and we should feel bad because the Americans didn't know how to handle it- but now I know that the US caused cruel and unimaginable harm, and was more tactless than I'd ever imagined.
It's a scary thought, that what many Americans know about history is what their public school books are required to teach them. The government plays a large role in choosing what books are read in public schools- from the literature in English classes to which adaptation of history is learned.
Actually, it's downright terrifying. No wonder some states have banned Ayn Rand's "1984" in their schools-- the government wouldn't want kids to learn how easy unchecked censorship is!
It was this thought that led me to connect Hollywood adaptations to the way I was taught history in my predominantly white, middle-class public school growing up. Luckily, my NYS district officials had no problem with us reading and discussing Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" and the previously mentioned "1984." The problem is that some Americans aren't as fortunate.
Flash back to that amazing movie trailer for "12 Years as a Slave" at the beginning of this post. The movie, which comes out later this week (Oct. 18th), is based on the 1853 autobiography "Twelve Years as a Slave" by Solomon Northup.
While you probably won't see advertisements for the movie on Twitter or shared by your friends on Facebook, it's an important movie that we all should see. Not because Brad Pitt is in it, but because the director isn't an American and has never worked in Hollywood.
Filmmaker Nelson George recently led a round-table discussion to broaden understanding and provide context for the upcoming film, and was joined by Chiwetel Ejiofor (who plays Northup), director Steve McQueen, and a small assortment of intellectuals who share passion and knowledge about the period of slavery in America and its relevance today.
The discussion that followed was a brief examination of why Americans are reluctant to talk about slavery and why now is an important time for the honest re-telling to be shared with the a larger audience. What I appreciated most about the discussion was the director's acceptance of reality and steady reluctance to create anything other than an honest illustration of what really happened to Solomon Northup.
As children, it seemed only natural to condemn slave owners and voice our disgust about the era in class, but looking back I can recall noticing kids and teachers glancing around the room before talking about it. I'm going to go ahead and assume that a lot of my white peers felt a sort of awkwardness talking about slavery when one or two black peers were in the class-- as if there was a sort of anticipation over whether or not the black students would give their own opinion and whether or not it would feel condemning of the white students. Would the black kids talk about their ancestors and how it affects their family today? That's something white students would have no clue about. Maybe the black students wouldn't even raise their hands because they don't want the white kids to imagine them for even a split-second as second class citizens. And would they? Why is that so taboo? Our country's politics give all races equal rights, right? And public schools' demographics reflect everyone who lives in a certain town, rather than dividing the town by race like it used to. But if that were the case, and if every American, regardless of race, is equal, why do little kids still feel weird talking about it? Is it because racial equality hasn't been fully reached yet? Is it possible to even reach, when a race that makes up 14.1%* of a country's people could have family history of enslavement by the race that makes up 80%* of the same land?
Why don't kids and teachers feel comfortable enough in a classroom to talk openly about a time they didn't even have to endure?
Well, what we do know is that slavery happened, and the ripples of its detrimental presence in American history are still felt today. Director McQueen sensed that the time to open the floodgates is now. The country is ready to absorb a real account of slavery without any flashy costumes or feel-good montages.
McQueen states,
"With Trayvon Martin, voting rights, the 150th anniversary of the abolition of slavery, 50th anniversary of the March on Washington and a black president, I think there’s a sort of perfect storm of events. I think people actually want to reflect on that horrendous recent past in order to go forward."
I hope movies as important as "12 Years as a Slave," along with other historically accurate documentaries, news reports and books, become more accessible for the Americans who have trouble with the context and materials their schools are providing them with. It's time for classrooms to offer more honest narratives about the very real events that make up our country's complex history.
I've had a revelation, and it's all thanks to someone named Robert McChesney.
After his visit to the College tonight, I couldn't help but feel inspired. He not only gave us insight into the research he did while writing his 23rd and 24th books, he also took our audience questions. The questions ranged from the typical social media issues of today, to Al Jazeera's new presence in the U.S., and everything in between. While I appreciated the lecture in its entirety, there was one idea McChesney shared that had me on a stream-of-consciousness warpath in my head for the rest of the presentation. He reiterated a point that I'd heard a million times, but summarized it in a way I hadn't even thought about.
When someone asked how the new issue of online surveillance affects the way journalists will be able to do their job, he answered,
"Fascism, right? Large corporations working hand-in-hand with the government! The only thing that will check that is journalism that checks the government, but right now we are getting smaller newsrooms and newspapers are dying!! ...Is there really any hope?"
Yes, yes, we've heard this all before. Print is dying, nobody reads magazines, blah blah blah. But it was what came after, that really struck a chord.
"American history pits and peaks with different eras and we're overdue by a good ten or fifteen years for a peak. I think we're right on the verge of that moment-- maybe we're even in it. For young people now, it's going to be in your best interest to get into this moment."
...Oh my god. He's right.
HE'S RIGHT!?!
When I started in Journalism as a freshman, I dove right in with giddiness and zeal because everything was so new and exciting. Once I hit sophomore year, though, I began to feel the pressure-- everything from the "where will I work?" questions to the "do I even want to do this?" ones. Why was I in a major that everyone around me was constantly discrediting? Sure, we all need news, but who will pay attention to it once nobody has a newspaper to read or they can just check twitter to see the one link everyone is reading? Who listens to Fox or CNN anymore, when they know half of it is bullsh*t?
But that's exactly why they need real journalists! And that's exactly what McChesney is saying.
Journalism shouldn't be "dying." Mainstream media should be.
I'm at this funky stage in my life, where I feel like a little sponge trying to take so much in. Studying abroad, along with being lucky enough to have a hands-on education at IC, has made me see that there's no way our generation is going down without a fight. In this strange time where a new mass shooting happens every day or the government feeds more and more lies to the public to spread throughout social media, there's something coming. I can feel it.
Real journalists aren't going to sit idly by and watch the values they hold so dear slip out of their hands. Have we reached a point where enough is enough? I'm sick of not being able to trust anything on TV. I'm tired of advertisements bombarding me everywhere I go, and learning that those corporations run so much of the world around us. The choices we make in what we eat, watch, spend money on... those all literally change our future! Corporations are using online surveillance and data gathering methods to basically try and control all the parts of our lives that requires decision-making.
I don't know about you, but I think people are starting to catch on. They're right-- turn off that Fox and CNN crap. Sure, end your newspaper subscription if you want. But more and more people are hitting up Independent online sources to figure out what's really going on in the world when they wake up in the morning or go to bed at night. As a general public, maybe we can be a little... uh... well, unintelligent. Ok. But as individuals? This generation coming up is the most tech-savvy we've ever had in America! They can connect the dots on computers and online in a way that those before us have never been able to do. They may be one of the largest groups of consumers we've seen in decades, but the majority of them can tell you what's real and what's fake. My little sister would never sit and tell a "Chat Bot" about her day on AIM the way we used to... "that's just stupid," she's said before. "Who knows where those robot answers are coming from."
I can feel it in my bones, though. Something big is going to happen, and it'll all be part of this technological revolution happening right before our eyes. But I can't just wait around for someone to do it for me. I have to stop giving mainstream media "page views" online and start reporting on the facts.
It's time for Independent media to step into the spotlight and remind society what it really means to tell the truth, and help people remember that each person's contributions to this world are much more powerful than they think.
