My first reaction to breaking news of Osama bin Laden’s death

I was fourteen when the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center took place on September 11th, 2001.  I very clearly remember the entire day, and it was one of the defining moments of my transition from childhood to adulthood.  In the days that followed the attacks I learned who Osama bin Laden was for the first time.  I’m not a hateful person, but I learned to hate bin Laden in that time.  I read the email forwards of jokes about his death, and silently agreed with my dad whenever he would menacingly wish for the opportunity to have “five minutes alone with bin Laden.”

Now the breaking story of the night is that bin Laden is dead.  America’s boogeyman for the last ten years is gone.  I haven’t thought about bin Laden much in the last few years, but I’m really surprised by my reaction, given how much I, like many others, learned to hate him after 9/11.  I feel hollow.  I think I was much like the rest of America in the first weeks and months after the attacks.  We wanted to get him. When we started the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan there seemed to be an undercurrent that we would go in, kill the bad guys like bin Laden, and leave, victorious.

The subsequent years have gone somewhat differently.  We’ve watched thousands of American soldiers die.  We’ve dumped hundreds of billions of dollars into the wars while we’ve seen unprecedented cuts in spending on health care and education.  As a country we’ve committed torture and abandoned the rights that we declared inalienable at our founding more than 200 years ago.  We’ve watched American influence wane and the foundations of our economy falter.  We are now facing what is very likely the end of the American era.

Think of what it has cost us.  Billions of dollars are just the start of it.  Even the abandonment of our fundamental values like habeas corpus and the Eight Amendment are only a piece. In the wake of that and the sheer human costs of war, the death of Osama bin Laden does not feel like a win.  It’s empty.  The fighting will keep going on.   Soldiers, insurgents and civilians will keep dying.  The troops aren’t all gonna come home tomorrow, and when they do, what will it have cost them?  What has it cost America?

I’m reminded of the old adage that things are always worth just a little bit less than what you give up to get them.  I’m guessing there will be some general celebration of this news over the next few days.  I won’t look down at anyone who does celebrate.  I’ll probably even return the high fives and join in the celebration.  However, I hope that we all take a moment to ask ourselves if getting our revenge was worth what it cost us.

For more information:

Cost of War

iCasualties

Amnesty International – Guantánamo Bay

Curiousity and the journalist

I am fundamentally a curious person.  I want to understand the world around me.  I fail miserably at it, but I try nonetheless.  In the tougher moments of being involved in journalism I occasionally am inclined to give the whole thing up, but when it’s good I get to learn some really cool stuff.

For me there is a joy in learning, new ideas are to me, almost comparable to a drug.  Yesterday, I got a crazy information high.

The chain of events was kicked off by me watching the RSAnimate video I linked to yesterday.  After finishing my post, I watched a few more RSAnimate videos.  Then I watched some TedTalks on hulu.com.  Then I watched got caught up watching Nova on PBS Video.   From there I fell down what Urban Dictionary calls a Wikipedia hole.  This is when you go from one article to the next, following link after link to sources and subtopics and articles on related subjects.

Before I even knew what was happening, 3 hours had passed.  I’d moved from Geothermal energy all the way to the Eugene Saturday Market and then I strangely transitioned back to the environment in the form of Carbon Offsetting, by way of the article on Nike.  After this my path fragmented hoplessly into a dozen different directions.  (Complete Path from environment and back: Geothermal Power>Kola Super deep borehole> Well to Hell Hoax >Weekly World News History > Elvis Presley Phenomenon > 24 Hour Church of Elvis > Portland Saturday Market > Eugene Saturday Market > Nike Corporation > Carbon Offsetting)

The moral of the story was that this was an extremely enjoyable Sunday afternoon.  I learned some useful stuff and a lot of less useful stuff, but it was extremely fun.  I encourage everyone to get lost in learning new stuff today!

Why fiction matters

As a journalist I tend to value things that reveal the truth.  I like investigative reporting and news on important issues.  As I’ve reembarked on studying statistics this term I’ve begun to remember their value in generating reliable answers to difficult questions.  Likewise, I’ve always admired science for it’s ability to illuminate the world.  However, there is one subject that people in the harder fields of study tend to disregard: English.   However, in my opinion, fiction, while not explicitly true, can reveal important truths about the human condition.  I’ve been thinking a bit about fiction and the arts in general because I think it can often explain things in a way that is truer than the cold facts.  While in high school I learned more about racism from Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mickingbird than from any textbook I ever read.  Later in college, I began to better understand mortality through reading William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying.

While I’m a sucker for fiction novels, I think it joins in the larger category of what art can do to help engage people.  In the following video, Sir Ken Robinson, an educational expert, discusses  how arts in school can help kids to engage and learn to be better critical thinkers.

A lot of what I love about journalism is that at it’s core it gives people information that hopefully allows them to make educated decisions and think critically.  I think that there is something that journalists can learn from art: the ability to engage people in meaningful ways and say things that people identify with as the truth on a emotional level.  I don’t mean to suggest that journalists should always go for emotion and drama.  Indeed, it seems like the only news organizations only use one emotion: fear.  Despite this I still think some of the best stories have a strong emotional core to them, and journalists, with all our concerns for hard facts and statistics should be aware of the essentially human nature of our profession.  This profile of a cigarette vendor published by the New York Times is a great example of this.  While it contains many hard facts describing the current situation of cigarette taxes in New York, at its core it tells the story of at a very real and human level.

Art is intrinsically aware of the human aesthetic and emotion.  Journalists can learn something from that.

The long interview

I’m guessing most people with experience in journalism have experienced an interview or two that lasted longer than they would have liked.  Those situations are part of the job and when you get more experienced with reporting you (hopefully) learn to control the interview a bit more, so that you can save yourself some time.  In the last few months I think I’ve been getting better as an interviewer, and I get better information faster than I did when I had less experience.  However, it occasionally happens that I lose control of an interview and it lasts way longer than I want it to.

I had one of those experiences recently and it was really hard to keep my subject on topic.  In the end I spent a few hours interviewing my subject but only 45 minutes of the conversation was on topic.  The situation was particularly frustrating because I used every tip and trick I’ve ever heard about to try to keep the conversation on track, but my subject kept straying to material that was unrelated to what I needed for my story.  The conversation was not unpleasant, but I ended up taking 3 times as long to do something, and as journalists know time is incredibly valuable when you are on deadline.  This source is the subject of a profile, so they are essential to the piece and I know that small talk is really important in building trust with a subject, but the situation was still difficult.

Although I’m moderately convinced that there are some sources who are always going to take longer to interview than you would like there were a few things I tried which seemed more productive than others:

1) The Segue – When you get into an unrelated discussion that lasts for a while try to find ways to steer the conversation back to the subject at hand.  The advantage of this technique is that it can be very natural and it won’t disrupt the flow of the conversation.  Simple phrases like “That reminds me that I wanted to ask about…” can be a simple and smooth way to move back to productive topics.

2) Just interrupt them – this is the opposite of the segue.  Sometimes, as rude as it seems, you just need to stop the conversation and go back to your questions.  If you are a polite person you may dislike this one at first – but after you’ve spent a bit too much time hearing about your subject’s last vacation you’ll get over that dislike pretty quick.

3) Talk about your deadline – Student journalists often have more time to work on stories than professionals; however, this does not mean that we  don’t have deadlines,  and you shouldn’t let your subjects forget either.  Not having open-ended conversations can help everyone involved be more focused.

Good luck interviewing!

Blogs to read: Patrick Rothfuss

I’m a geek for a lot of things.  I get really into discussions of statistics.  I can go on for hours about ethics in journalism.  You don’t want to get into a conversation with me about Canon lenses.  As much of a nerd for journalism as I am, I also am a nerd for fiction.  I follow a number of blogs by science fiction and fantasy authors and I really like a lot of them, but I think that Patrick Rothfuss, New York Times Best Selling author of The Name of the Wind and Wise Man’s Fears, keeps a blog that is worth reading even if you aren’t a fan of his books or even this genre.

In addition to talking about the process for publishing and promoting a book, Rothfuss also discusses the craft of writing.  I’ve always enjoyed writing and I often think about writing my own book.  However, as a student and journalist I’m not really used to writing anything very long.  The process is quite daunting.  I really enjoy reading Rothfuss because he talks about the process of writing in a way that I can really understand.  This post on revisions thoroughly documents an entire days worth of work on his book.  I enjoy reading his blog because it encourages me to write and helps me to get over the daunting idea of writing something as long as a book.  Even if you write something besides fiction, I still think he is worth reading.  Rothfuss’ emphasis on detail and rewriting thoroughly is something that journalists can benefit from too.

Plus, Rothfuss is pretty darn funny.  In this post he discusses how his book passed Donald Rumsfeld’s Known and Unknown on Amazon’s sales list and he concludes with “Suck it, Rumsfeld!”

University of Oregon to Host Noam Chomsky

Noted scholar of linguistics and prominent media critic Noam Chomsky is scheduled to present in 150 Columbia on the UO campus on April 20th.  For more information about the speech visit the UO English Department’s events page.

To call Noam Chomsky a controversial figure is something of  a gross understatement.  He is undoubtedly one of the most prominent scholars of linguistics, yet he is often villified as an extreme radical for his criticism of the media and US foreign policy.

I’m personally not sure what my opinion of Chomsky is.  I don’t know anything about linguistics,  so I can offer no opinion of  him there and I have mixed feelings about his political activism as well.  I’ve watched his film Manufacturing Consent and I find myself sympathetic to many of his criticisms of the media, yet I do think he takes his suspicion of the government and corporate interests to a level that seems improbable. At points his discussion he ascribes such a deliberate maliciousness to people with power that seems to be poorly supported.

That being said, there is no way I’m not going to be there to watch him speak.

I may not agree with his every point, but Chomsky is without a doubt worth listening to.  The University of Oregon Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists is screening Manufacturing Consent on Tuesday April 12th 2011 at 6:00 PM in Allen HoA.  The event will include pauses for discussion, so you have a chance to revisit the film in context, prior to the event.

While I have

My review of the “The Legally Prohibited from being funny on television tour” premiere

I will start this review by disclosing my bias:  I love Conan O’Brien.  I spent a lot of money on tickets to this show and I was expecting a lot.  A part of me was skeptical that anything that I saw would be enough to live up to the the expectations I had.

That being said:

This show freaking rocks.

I normally love Conan, his show is funny and pleasant, but rarely does it blow my mind or make me laugh uncontrollably.  This show managed not only to make me laugh out loud, it managed to do it for nearly two straight hours. The format is similar to his late night shows, the Andy Richter and the band are there, there are short video clips and musical numbers.  There are no celebrity interviews, so in a way its like Conan’s late night shows with only the most entertaining pieces.  Here are a few of the funniest and most memorable bits:

The show began with a video clip of Conan that begins with the text “One month ago…” The clip shows a hobo-esque Conan, complete with beard extensions and fat suit desperatley answering his phone looking for work only to realize its a wrong number.  In my opinion the clip is one of the best gags in the show, there is something funny watching him wallow ridiculously to the song “All by myself.”  The slobby, wino Conan finally gets a call asking him to do the live show, to which he immediately agrees.   He is asked if he is in shape, and he looks at the camera and says “yes I am.”  The training montage that follows is very funny and is made perfect by the moment when Conan rips off the fat suit he was wearing, breaking the fourth wall in a clever, winking way.

Conan emerged on stage looking a bit more casual than on “The Tonight Show” as he grew a beard and was not wearing a tie.  The more laid-back look matched his performance, which was a lot more of the let-loose Conan we all loved on Late Night.  Conan also seems liberated by not having to stay on mark for the cameras, using the full stage for his awkward/awesome classic moves like the string dance.

Lots of other old favorites are back, under new names that the audience is supposed to see through, like the “masturbating bear” becoming the “self-pleasuring panda” and the “Walker Texas Ranger lever” is now the “Chuck Norris rural policeman handle.”  Jack McBrayer, of the NBC show 30 Rock, drops bye to pull the new “handle.”  Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, drops by in a very clever segment that makes jokes about Eugene being a place to go to get “meth lab supplies.”

Other Eugene institutions were not spared the criticism, both Dicky Jo’s and Burrito Boy were lampooned.  In a new bit developed just for the road, local commercials, Burrito  Boy was described as having “prices even the homeless can afford.”  The show was scattered with references to Eugene, which the audience predictably loved.

Conan again demonstrates his musical chops in the numerous songs that are played, including “I will Survive” and “On the Road Again.”

Overall, the show watched like it was two hours of the best material from a few months all crammed into one high paced and energetic performance.  The best of the old jokes are back, but in new and fresh ways, and there was a lot of new material to surprise even the die-hard fans.  The show is more fun live and Conan and team spent timeout in the audience during the musical numbers, making the show much more intimate and exciting.

Conan opened the show by saying “I’m not supposed to admit this ladies and gentleman, but I really missed  the applause.”  We  all missed Conan too, and having seen this show I’m excited about the material he’s going to bring to TBS this fall.

Make friends with an international student today!

Some of the best friends I’ve ever had I met while I was on study abroad.  The weird thing though is this: while I was living in Norway I didn’t really make good friends with any Norwegians, all my friends were other international students.  It was awesome to get to know so many cool people from all over the world, but a part of me still wishes that I’d gotten to be friends with more Norwegians.

One of my Norwegian professors explained it to our class, of mostly international students, that the problem was that most of the Norwegian students already had groups of friends, and its really hard for an international student to break into well-established social cliques.

This always seemed a very good explanation to me because when I thought about it I realized that even though I met tons of international students at my university at home I wasn’t good friends with any of them.  I’ve tried to make it a point ever since to make friends with international students because I know how hard it is to make friends with natives.  While I think everyone should be friendly to foreign people because it is a nice thing to do, there are other reasons to motivate those of you who are more selfish:  if you make friends with exchange students they will sometimes invite you to visit them in their home countries.  This is a wicked awesome way to travel, you can save money by staying with them, your friend will tell you where to go and what to see and sometimes even help you find it.

Oh, and it is also really fun to be friends with international students.  My little sister Anna and I took a friend of mine from Japan on a day trip along the Mckenzie River over spring break.  We visited Sahalie Falls, Clear Lake and then went canoeing at Leaburg Reservoir.  We had a lot of fun and it was a great trip.  As much fun as it was to organize a trip so a friend could see some neat stuff it was nice for me too, I was motivated to get out and enjoy my state in a way I wouldn’t have otherwise.

Is banning plastic bags the right decision for the environment?

As someone who loves the outdoors I have often thought about the effects of plastics on the environment.  I’ve always assumed that plastic grocery bags were inherently bad, and when I saw that the state of Oregon wanted to ban plastic bags last month my interest was piqued.  When I dug into the issue a little deeper and talked to a few experts I found that the issue was at once much scarier and much less clear cut than I initially thought.

This is what I heard:

You can also read a more news-style story I wrote on the issue for another blog.

World Literacy: T Shirt Travels

I recently watched a documentary for extra credit in a class and I think it is really worth watching.  I think it gives some very good insight into the economic and cultural imperialism of Africa at the hands of the West.  The documentary follows T Shirts that are given to charity in the US to Zambia where they are sold by street vendors.

The trade of second hand clothes in developing nations is most interesting in that it shows some the effects of trade liberalization and other macroeconomic events on a human level.  Its easy to get caught up in  the theory and the terminology, it is a completely different thing to see what effect it has actually had on the daily lives of people in these countries.

The whole thing is available here: