The Road Less Traveled

In my opinion, one of the most important jobs in this world is held by those who report from the parts of the world ‘less traveled by’. My favorite poem, by Robert Frost, finishes like this:

“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.”

Today’s New York Times prominently features a story on the inherent dangers associated with reporting from places often forgotten about. Sometimes the reasons for the inattention are due to the country’s lack of resources, failing public infrastructure or disassociated importance from the rest of the world. But often such places are not read about because of political pressure keeping such things unsaid. But ask any foreign correspondent about his or her sense of accomplishment and the answer will revolve around traveling the road less traveled. They have, putting their own lives in danger, impacted change throughout history in the most important way; telling stories.

Now, with the fractured media landscape and cost-cutting, these stories are not being told in the same fashion. First, we are seeing an increased bias towards “American” coverage, as opposed to news from the rest of the world, as I wrote about in April. But what international stories are being told, are being reported by different people or at least backed by different and less powerful organizations than the BBC and CNN. This has a very dramatic effect on the coverage or lack there of…

Back in March I asked my readers the following question after journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee were detained by the North Korean government:

“However, my more pressing question is whether or not the North Koreans would have detained the two for more than a few hours or days had they been on assignment for a large news organization. My guess is no; the larger organization would have worked to arrange their release sooner than Current TV is doing. Of course, it doesn’t even appear that Al Gore, the Chairman of Current TV and one of its primary investors, has had any affect on the situation (either out of choice or not). I’m sure the diplomatic back channels are buzzing because of Gore’s connection, but take a circumstance where the independent journalists don’t have the backing of a former Vice President. Do you think the same thing would be playing out? There are examples of this out there for sure. In Russian it doesn’t matter how big or small your backing is, but in African countries or other locales where the central government isn’t as powerful as in Moscow or Pyongyang, would it make a difference? What about in China where economic policy seems to trump all? When NBC has the backing of GE, does that matter? What do you think? Are small and independent news organizations more susceptible to political pressure with diminished resources for negotiation and the inability to apply appropriate political pressure?”

Apparently the mainstream media has caught wind of this precarious situation with today’s Times’ article. But if Al Gore’s journalists can be sentenced to 12 years in a labor camp, where does this leave us? Where does this leave those brave journalists willing to travel the road less traveled by, in order to make what difference they can?