WHEN THE PEN IS MIGHTIER THAN THE SWORD

When the pen is mightier than the sword

There is one thing that is not taught in any school of journalism and yet, is a subject of vital concern. And that is a certain sensitivity towards the feelings of those who are written about. A reporting career comes with the ability to make or break that of others. Unlike sundry other jobs which revolve around machines or files or travel, journalists are constantly dealing with people and issues (which too touch lives). We hear, we take notes, we click pictures. But do we listen?

Businesses are usually desperate for publicity. An mainstream article can add greater credibility to an enterprise than a dozen ads. PR agencies with deep pockets aggressively push products and nowadays, people. They hang hopefully around editors for a whim which could make or break their clientele (atleast in the short run). Managing the media turns personalities into big brands. Plush promos and inspired invites get the well-compensated managers what they are looking for---publicity.

Sacrificed at this altar of give and take are those who neither have the resources nor the ability to get their 15 lines of fame. An animal rights activist, who had been involved in seizing a truckload of illegally transported cattle, was promised coverage by the reporter of a leading daily. At 3 a.m., instead of going home to sleep, she drove halfway across the city with the pictures she had promised him. The story was never carried. The disillusioned woman admits to hating reporters as much as she needs them.

As a freelancer, the words I dread most are "we might use it". Outright rejection of a potential topic cleanly severs what the aforementioned vague promise turns into a festering wound. Journalists chasing a good story are chasing real people. People who trust them with their thoughts, their dreams, their work, their vanity. One elderly woman, headmistress of a municipal school, purchased every expensive issue of a glossy which was to feature her - seven months down the line, they carried the story in their Northern and National editions which never made it to the stands of the city she lived in. Four more months have since passed and she still hasn’t seen herself in print.

When a feature is sought - and then rejected (as it happens more often than it should) - it is more than just an article which is shelved. A friend wrote a serious article advocating adoption. She was requested to give her personal story (of adopting a daughter after she had her biological son), to be provided as an interesting "box". Quite impassioned about the issue, she complied. Without so much as her consent, the original writing was completely done away with and the proposed "aside" became the main story. When the long becomes short, right can become wrong.

In the male dominated bastion of photography, toes are treaded on harder. One chap I know of promises a lot of cheese in the process of getting his subjects to smile. The commonest bait is copies of pictures. Once his job is done he forgets the very people who let him capture the privacy of their home, the innocence of their children, the vulnerability of wanting to look good.

I have never known him to find "where those darned negatives went...I am shooting ten rolls a week, most of them I don’t even print...it’s impossible to keep track." No points for guessing that an organized archives would mean losing a new assignment and repeating old pictures when the interviewees are featured again for, perhaps, a quote. Besides, of course, the problem of entertaining cumbersome requests. The bigger the organization, the more boorish the journalistic brigade. Turning up late for events is one common occurrence, appearing jaded and bored in front of fawning organizers, is another.