Who Decides the Truth: The Unreality of Journalism, Part 3
CyberChaikhana, Uzbekistan4 Comments
What is a journalist to believe? Image by Flickr user julianrod (CC-usage).
Editor’s note: neweurasia’s Musafirbek Ozod goes beyond statistics and formal reports to write about what it’s actually like to live and work as a journalist in Uzbekistan. This is the third part of a series, and part of the ongoing CyberChaikhana project.
Here the young blogger reflects upon his own reasons for becoming a journalist. Recalling a past conversation with an independent editor, he must confront a difficult reality: in Uzbekistan, even the very notion of truth is political, and its pursuit comes at a high price.
If the situation for young journalists in Uzbekistan is so terrible, then why did I become one? Like my peers, I originally had very naive and idealistic motivations.
Yet, I had never before confronted myself with the question: just what is Truth in Uzbekistan — and what does it take to be a journalist truly seeking it? But then a few years ago, while interviewing for a job at an independent news agency, I had a conversation that exploded my vague preconceptions.
The editor-in-chief sat me down and asked me why I wanted to become a journalist, and I answered that I wanted to serve my society: to expose injustice, to make authorities accountable to civil society, and to help my countrymen during crises.
“Yes, but so do representatives of other professions,” he retorted.
I thought it over and realized that he was right: the desire to serve was not in itself a rationale for becoming a journalist. I felt a pressing need to give him answer, and so I said, “I want to tell the truth to my countrymen.”
“Does a journalist have the capacity to determine what the truth is?” he asked.
Again, I realized he was right. Were journalists truth-speakers or truth-seekers? By what measure could we decide what is and isn’t reality?
Suddenly faced with an existential crisis, my need to give him an answer becamethe need to give myself an answer. Desperate, I sputtered, “I want to be an independent journalst and report on a situation completely objectively, without any feeling of influence upon me whatsoever!”
He studied me for a moment, then calmly said, “Do you really want to be independent in whatever you do? Then, you should remember that the definition of independence is when everyone hates you.”
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Desiring to become a journalist in the onset of ones career is idealistic and can be understood for the realities of the real world haven’t fully set in. Fresh from the university, what could one expect but theories and the value of hope driving the younghorn into passions of changin the world!
Yet, i see this desire arising form the failure of the senior journalists to deliver what the calling of the profession had in the first place. If it did deliver the truth and all the ideals that it was meant to stand up for, would Uzbekistan still be under such tyranny? Would your countrymen still be in the shadows of unreality? What change could the senior journalists bring about when they question the very essence of a young individiuals desire for personal independence, prevailing truth, and the call or cry for freedom?
I would describe the seniors to be so anesthetized. Recieving doses of unrealities, paraphrasing them into words of euphemism to describe the ugly realities. Making the unbearable bearable! Sadly, who can blame them when they live like puppets in a government who idolizes itself. How could change come about then?
I believe change comes from within. Who will survive? Those who have the balls to call the shots of truth and those who are unafraid to show faces that become the epitome of change. Those who have the character consistently craving for the truth and for freedom.
Turn to the youth, the hope of Uzbekistan… THE ONLY HOPE OF UZBEKISTAN!
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Seen from a distance, the problems are anywhere the same; they are maybe less visible in western europe.
But is this better or worse? You don’t have any political pressure, just the omnipresent, but hidden, economic forces that drive you to be nice.
The threats may be minor, but the power is nontheless strong: there is a lot you can win or lose
But because it’s not a direct threat, journalists in western europe ask the fundamental questions you raised in your story less often…
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