new gig

You're looking at the newest intern for High Speed Productions, Inc.

HSP produces three magazines: Thrasher, Juxtapoz, and Slap. Today was my first day, and I spent the entire time transcribing an artist interview that will appear in Slap. I may be developing carpal tunnel syndrom. But I couldn't be happier.

:)

With great power comes great responsibility

So last week I had my first great big genuine journalistic fuck-up.

The story: the USF Faculty Association was holding "informational picketing" sessions last Monday and Wednesday to raise awareness about their ongoing contract negotiations with the administration.

I got in touch with the president of the USFFA and had a phone interview with him over the weekend. Then I figured I could get in touch with the rest of my sources on Monday as the picketing was going on.

The Foghorn does layout Monday night. I had Monday afternoon (my only free time after three classes) to gather the majority of my sources and write the entire 600+ word article. I quickly spoke to as many people as I could who were outside at the event, and then scrambled into the Foghorn office to get my words onto paper, fast.

The story was, I thought, a success. It was long. There were a lot of quotes. My grammar was superb and the story flowed quite nicely. A+ work, I thought.

Sometime around Tuesday, I got a nagging feeling in my stomach. There was something not right about my story. By Wednesday, it was quite clear: my story only presented one side of the issue. Only USFFA picketers and supportive students were quoted. There was no representation from the administration, nor any dissenting faculty or student voices. Oh. Shit.

Sure enough, Thursday morning, after the paper had been on the newsstands no more than 12 hours, Fr. Stephen Privett, USF president, sent the Foghorn an extremely angry e-mail. I'll quote for you some of Privett's more stinging insults:

• "The article is a classic case of 'Fox' journalism where one and only one perspective is passed it off as 'news.'"

• "How can anyone with a brain think that the University 'has run economic surpluses of $40 million a year for the last three years?'"

• "Had your reporter taken the time to at least review my convocation address, she might have had a clue about the University’s overall financial situation."

• "The Foghorn’s passing off such a one-sided, partisan discussion of a very complex situation as a 'new' article is inexcusable."

Etc. etc.

Ouch.

I definitely regret not spending more time gathering interviews to create a balanced article. It's true that the article was "biased." Not in the sense that I included my own opinions in the piece, but in the sense that I only interviewed people on one side of the issue. Was this based on my own feelings about the faculty contract negotiations? Hardly! It was simply a matter of a busy student journalist trying to do too much in too little time.

I realize now that when one has the great responsibility of covering a story that actually MATTERS to a lot of people, a reporter has to be extremely fair to each and every side -- and if I was too busy to cover the story responsibly, I should have held it for the next week's issue or asked for help from another reporter.

Though I think Fr. Privett's e-mail was a tad harsh, I definitely feel remorseful. Cheesy as it sounds, I learned a valuable lesson from this experience.

Please, read the story for yourself and tell me what you think. And this goes back to my last week's blog post: how do you go about defining bias? And is it always such a horrible thing? Anyway, things to ponder...

A question of objectivity

When my journalism and media studies professors lecture on the idea of objectivity, neutrality, or bias in journalism, it always leaves me deep in thought. Most people go about reading their news assuming it is neutral, unless there is an overt slant. If such a slant does exist, they usually become turned off. "This is so BIASED!" like it's a dirty word.

Is bias a bad thing? Usually the conclusion we draw in my classes is that everyone is biased, everyone has their own sets of beliefs, everyone cannot help but feel the things they feel, and so -- even in journalism -- it is impossible for anyone to be entirely 100% neutral.

For many consumers of news, neutrality is considered the golden standard, but I'm not sure that is always best. Should one really be neutral about issues of genocide, racism, murder or torture? Or a harder question: should one be neutral about fighting in unjust wars or passing discriminatory propositions if doing so would contradict personal convictions?

Most importantly: is neutrality really the way to lead readers to the truth?

My Creations

They say creativity is something most people lose as they grow older. I know this to be true for me, as I have already seen my creativity deteriorate drastically. When I was little, my sister and I would spend hours upon hours sitting at the kitchen table with nothing but markers and a stack of blank white paper. With this we would create all kinds of art, art that told stories about completely fictitious people, places, and things. As I grew a bit older, writing became my forte. I would write all the time. Short stories flew off my fingertips magically. Characters with all sorts of complex problems and situations would suddenly exist out of nothingness, simply because I created them.

Now, these tasks seem daunting. My perfectionist instincts halt any creative urges at the door. If I were to draw something, it would have to look realistic, the shading would have to be accurate, the shadow would have to correspond to the light falling... If I were to write, there would have to be great symbolism, social commentary, wit, sophisticated diction and syntax... I forfeit before I enter the game.

I would like to keep whatever remaining creativity I have. Blogging my creative pursuits will allow me to see all that I have accomplished and might actually help strengthen the creative side of my mind.

Lately, my mom has been into beading necklaces, and has taught me a few basic tricks of the trade. I saw these small bird charms at a little store called The Bead Shoppe in Roseville, CA and became immediately inspired to make earrings out of them. Here is how they came out:


I love how simple they look. The red and gold is a very sweet color combination I think. And I love how the birds look like they are swinging from a perch. This project was very simple and fun to do!

Hopefully keeping this blog will have the twofold effect of not only allowing me to see all of my work and progress in one place, but also encouraging and inspiring me to do even more creative endeavors.

Israel

Imagine growing up as an American secular Jew, but finding out that simply because of the blood that flows through my veins, Jewish blood, I am eligible for a free 10 day trip to Israel. As I applied for the trip, I felt like a fraud. (After all, I am not that Jewish. I did not have a bat mitzah, I do not fast for Yom Kippur, I have rarely set foot inside a synagogue.) And yet they accepted me and sent me my travel information. Fast forward to June 12. As my plane lands in the Ben Gurion airport and I make my first few steps in the land of Israel, I am greeted with the words "Welcome Home." What can this possibly mean? Home is in Roseville, California. Home is the United States. Home is paved roads and shopping malls. How can this strange country full of deserts, seas, rivers, foreign insects and animals, and a language I don't even speak be a home to me?

I try to search for a feeling of home throughout my 10 days in Israel. I am traveling with my sister and 38 other American Jews, mostly from the Los Angeles area. We form a fast bond, all of us coming from similar backgrounds and sharing this amazing experience together. With them I feel at home. All of us remark that we feel that we've known each other our whole lives.

But can the country itself ever feel like home? All the beautiful sites.. the stunning views of desert, sea, hills, valleys, the historic cities and towns, the ancient buildings that defined history. Do I feel at home here? I feel unworthy of this beautiful country being my home. It is so rich, textured, old, and important.

I experienced so much in those ten days, so much that to describe it all here would be futile. Do look at my Flickr set to see it all as I tried to capture as much as I could. But to float in the Dead Sea and feel the stinging of salt in your eyes, to ride on a camel's back through the Negev desert as people have done for thousands of years before you, to raft down the Jordan River, to sleep in a tent on the banks of the Sea of Galilee, to eat Falafel in downtown Tel Aviv as you stroll through an outdoor market, to pray by the Western Wall, to be stung by jellyfish in the Mediterranean... all of this cannot be captured in words or photos. As I am back home fighting jet lag from the 15 hour flight back from Tel Aviv to Los Angeles, the whole thing seems like one of those dreams that was so good that you wish you could fall back asleep and be in the dream again.

The final day of the trip, the meaning of Israel being a homeland started to make sense. After nine days of sheer pleasure, the trip took a solemn turn as we visited Yad Vashem, the holocaust memorial museum in Jerusalem. The Holocaust and the existence of the State of Israel are nearly impossible to separate. While some deny a cause/effect relationship, one can't help but acknowledge the sense of urgency with which Israel was formed shortly after the end of World War II. Being in the museum, seeing all of those people who look like you and lived a similarly carefree life, never suspecting anything like that could happen to them... and then seeing that the rest of the world could care less... that even the United States, the country that I call home, did not care if my Jewish relatives lived or died... I suddenly started to see how Israel is a sort of home. Because heaven forbid anything should ever happen, I will have a place to go and be safe. And I could go there tomorrow, ask for citizenship, and be granted it without hesitation.

But it is impossible to go through all of this without feeling torn about the conflict with the Palestinians. Is it fair that the safety and unity of the Jewish people should come at the expense of that of another group? Is it fair that my best friend, who is Palestinian and whose parents own property in a Palestinian territory, just got 40% of his land taken away by the Israeli government? How can I feel joy about this supposed homeland when it is tainted with the knowledge that another people are suffering? Is it possible to simply charge it to the game, and say life's not fair, but ultimately this is the best solution? I don't know.

I do know I had an amazing experience, and feel beyond blessed to have had it. I hope to return someday, but even more I ultimately hope for peace in the region.

Summer and the suburb

I am home sweet home in Roseville, California, land of a thousand malls. Here are a few interesting anecdotes about Roseville pulled from its Wikipedia page:

• Roseville has the ninth highest retail sales of all California cities; Roseville is also the smallest of the fifteen top ranked cities in retail sales.
• Roseville has one of the largest Auto Malls in the country.
• Roseville was ranked the skinniest city in the country, with an average body mass index of 24.5.

Other than my upcoming trip to Israel (in like three weeks!!!), my summer remains a blank slate. We shall see what develops.

I love California

I love my state.

Court Affirms Marriage Equality in California

I love how the courts acknowledged that the word "marriage" was of actual importance, and no matter how similar the rights afforded in "civil unions" or "domestic partnerships" or what have you were, it was still not equal, the same way forcing African American children to attend separate schools was not actually equal.

Now can we get a democratic presidential candidate who will step up and support gay marriage?

On second thought, maybe he/she ought to wait until he/she is elected, and then hit them with the news.

Now, a funny cartoon: