The OPC, New York Women’s Initiative for CARE and New York University’s Wagner School hosted a panel on “Humanitarian Emergencies: the Role of the Media” at NYU on September 22.
Panelists included Allan Dodds Frank, investigative reporter and former OPC president, founder of OPC Global Parachute; Cath Turner, reporter and producer, Al Jazeera English; Hina Chaudhry, MD, associate professor of medicine at Mount Sinai; and Sam Gregory, program director, Witness, co-author of Cameras Everywhere 2011 Report. The panel was moderated by Alan Murray, deputy managing editor and executive editor, online, The Wall Street Journal.
Frank led the panel off asking who is there to cover people who are suffering and how are these people covered and portrayed in the media? He said he used to think tagging along with a non-governmental organization sullied the integrity of the journalist. “People still want to go and report. The question is, how do you fund it?” Frank said. “What you have now are people who write for many publications. Hybrid journalists go overseas with Save the Children to pay for their trip. If a younger or older reporter does this and fully discloses it, then it’s okay.”
Turner from Al Jazeera said it takes moneyto put boots on the ground. “The man who owns Al Jazeera is very rich,” she said. “The money goes not salaries but to infrastructure.”
Gregory of Witness.org spoke about how his organization began 20 years ago with the amateur video footage of the Rodney King beating. “Now it’s easier to report but there are increased safety risks to people who are not journalists in the traditinoal sense,” Gregory said.
All agreed there’s more information now than ever to slog through, so the question, left unanswered, is who will curate all the media find the legitimate news reports? And what impact non-governmental organizations has on traditional media. Frank summarized by saying, “journalism gives you the facts, which is better than giving you a sermon.”