The Devil's Excrement

In today’s El Nacional (page A-7), columnist Fausto Maso writes an article on media objectivity which I am sure is in response to yesterday’s press conference between the local media and foreign correspondents in which the objectivity of local media was repeatedly questioned. I took the liberty of translating it freely:

(Picture of yesterday’s march, an everyday affair)

The cowardice of false objectivity by Fausto Maso

Good reporting presents both sides of a story, it opens pages or microphones to diverse opinions, but it is not silenced when faced by a crime: it doesn’t confuse objectivity with complicity. Our Schools of Journalism, specially that of Universidad Central de Venezuela, always rejected the false objectivity which conceals that cowardice. The New York Times did not cross its arms on September 11 2001, nor do the American or British reporters go around the world looking for inteviews with Bin Laden and his followers, nor do they publish in front page their statements. In Spain they call ETA a terrorist organization. Great reporters never informed about Vietnam aseptically, neither are they neutral in Colombia with the guerrilla. They take sides. Some foreign correspondents belive innocently that in Venezuela two sides are facing each other in a civil war, they suppose that they are witnessing a fight between rich and poor. They are more lost than Lindbergh’s son! The threat against Venezuelans is genocide, the killing of unarmed civilians in the hands of those backed by the Government. What Cicil War? Pots against machine guns! You have got to be kidding me….Can we be neutral? Noooooooooo…

This entry was posted on December 14, 2002 at 11:41 am and is filed under Venezuela.