What (most
of) our editors think about inclusion in the newsroom, and why I disagree
Recently I
was invited to a discussion on how media has presented federalism, and how it
should present federalism in the future. The first half was, to say the least,
very enlightening. Editors of prominent media talked about how Nepali media is
event driven, which is why events and leaders’ speeches get more coverage than
the structure of states in federalism. Also, emotional issues like identity and
number of states have overshadowed substantive debates on the mechanisms of
state division.
One editor’s
point, that perhaps these emotional issues are required to raise the issue of
rights, was thought provoking, because indeed, the issue of decentralization
and devolution of power have been brought up again and again, but no concrete
steps had been taken until the emotional issues of identity took centre-stage, which
then propelled stakeholders into action.
Regarding
whether or not federalism is necessary, only one out of the five editors
categorically stated that federalism, or the division of states, is not
necessary. What is required is the devolution of power. I agree with him, even
though for everyone else it was an agenda that we could not go back on, having
been mandated by the people. I have doubts regarding that, because as one of
the editors himself said, every party has been grey on federalism in their
agendas. I was out in the streets in 2006 protesting against certain things,
and I don’t remember endorsing federalism. I assume it is the same with most
people who gave the parties their “mandate.” They supported the parties to
solve immediate problems, not necessarily because they wanted federalism.
And then a
journalist opened the Pandora’s Box by asking about inclusion. Newsrooms are
not very inclusive, said he, and could that have contributed to a one-sided
discussion of federalism among the public? No no, said the editors, all but one.
We select journalists based on competence, not inclusion. I never try to make
my newsroom inclusive, said one. I receive a lot of criticism for having the
least number of women in my newsroom, said another.
The
journalist again pointed out that international studies indicate that there is
a direct correlation between the composition of a newsroom and the news it
produces. The program organizer had said in the beginning, when he gave a
background to the program, that there is very little understanding of
federalism among the public, and what is there is negative—people think of it
as a ‘desh tukryaune’ tactic. But that is exactly the perception of the high
caste males that dominate the newsroom! Like the Madhesi journalist pointed
out, if you listen to radio programs operated by madhesi journalists, the
perspective is completely different. Editors harped on ‘competence’ for a long
time, but this example makes it evident that journalists’ bias is taking over competence
their reporting.
Editors may
claim that neither they nor their reporters are biased, but your bias is not something
that you can see yourself. At least, not people of normal intelligence. Editors
are supposed to be above normal intelligence though. By insisting on this ‘quality,’
which probably means good writing skills, editors are missing out on the balanced
viewpoint that could emerge from a diverse newsroom.
As stated
above, personally I am not for federalism, but here I was outraged for those who
are: to hear that editors thought others’ opinion did not matter, that their
little clique of likeminded cronies was sufficient. They had the audacity to
believe they could think for the whole country, and that the difference in
schools of thought brought about by socio-economic upbringing is not important.
Editors put
up ludicrous claims to justify their stance, from ‘I have seen writers from one
dalit community ask me to kill a story by a writer of the same community’(writers
from every community do that, even your high caste males that dominate your
newsroom do that. That does not make a case against not having them, nor make
them less ‘competent’) to ‘we have done a report of madhesh by a bahun that was
highly appreciated’ (but you have nothing to compare it to. How do you know a madheshi
would not have said something different? For millennia men have been writing
humiliating treatises about women, which have been highly appreciated and
applauded by men, their primary audience. Giving opinions and receiving applause
from a tiny echo-chamber does not say much about the comprehensiveness of your reports.)
Now, it is
no secret to anyone in the journalism community that editorials are written by
editorial teams, though under the editor’s supervision and approval. Having worked
in the editorial team, I know exactly how inclusion matters. Editorial is taken
as the voice of authority, actually, all of media—to those outside the media
fraternity, but editorials even more so. When I write about women’s issues in
the editorial, it is very different from the way my male colleagues. Despite
the fact that my colleagues were very nice, most undiscriminating, and
sympathetic to women, they just could not understand the finer nuances of, for
example, what menstruation rituals meant to women (not just a means for ensuring
hygiene, but also for ensuring women’s secondary place in society, their
obedience in terms of religion, and a means to bar them from religious
decision-making which have far flung implications), how abortion is perceived (several
socio-cultural factors lie behind every decision to abort, but mainstream media
portrays only the woman as question as guilty for abortion). But hitherto, few
of these views had been regarded as authoritative, simply because there have
been fewer women in the media. Injecting a little bit of women’s viewpoint was
a step towards a balanced discourse on these issues.
Perhaps the
most disheartening comment about inclusion was when editor said that inclusion
may be relevant in other sectors, but not in journalism. Journalists set the
agenda for the whole country, journalists make opinions. And the point of
federalism is not just to ensure access to resources but also to information
and to opinion making. Without this access, people have no way of correcting
the biases and misinformation against them, or of raising their agendas. If,
without the participation of marginalized groups, a small group could raise
everyone’s agenda, then we would never have arrived at this unequal society in
the first place. We are here because every group that controls knowledge thinks
only of itself. Inclusion is, first and foremost, important in the place where
information is created. Only a diverse team at this level has any chance of
creating a discourse that is, through a dialectic process of give and take, balanced.
After that,
I could not concentrate on anything else. My mind was so disturbed by this unanimous show against
inclusion that I have absolutely no memory of what the rest of the session was like.
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