Hey all,

My experience with Hispanic Link can be explained in the following anecdote. This past weekend, while the world obsessed over Health Care, public option, Dennis Kucinich and the like, everyone at the Link focused on immigration. What some outlets considered a brief, we considered A1. While my roommates were running, getting their blazers and making their way to the chamber to witness the closure of a century-long debate, I was coming home from an exhausting day where 200,000 gathered to demand Immigration Reform.

I then started thinking on the march. As a Hispanic Journalist I can’t help but feel some attachment to what I am covering. It hurt me not to clap when Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez spoke from the heart. It was impossible to refrain from chanting “si se puede.” These are the pleas of my people. Esta es mi gente, I later told my editor.

And the Piolín came up. Now, for you guys who don’t know who he is, he is a syndicated radio host. He motivated hundreds from Los Angeles to participate in the march and the previous one in 2006. This Sunday, he was the last speaker…

…But back home Piolín is also the one my father and I would listen to in Phoenix every morning.

When he came down from the stage, I wasn’t reporting anymore. I was a fan and though I knew I would ask him for a picture, I turned off my camera almost as a mental note to remind myself—no quotes, no bias. “Piolín, can you send a shout-out to my father he listens to you every morning from Phoenix.” He did. I ran home called my dad and played the greeting back to him. I could tell from his voice he was exited.

Am I still a journalist? Am I a protestor, a pleading voice? I will never hesitate to have others such as Tom Tancredo and the Tea Party voice their side. Hearing different opinions is what shapes tolerance and understanding. It’s why I love my job.

But I will not ignore this fact: Sunday’s struggle was my struggle. In this bubble, where health care was but a brief political chant used by Florida Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart to tell the thousands who gathered that “We couldn’t approach immigration the way we did health care,” I was home

Esos que unieron sus voces eran mis tias, primos, tios, amigos, hermanos, my madre y mi padre.

Those who demanded justice were my aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters, my friends, my mother and father and me. This is a personal struggle that challenges the core of my very principles.

This is a really important discussion. It cuts at the heart of 1.) what we do/don’t do as journalists, 2.) what we feel as people/ citizens, and how we balance those two.
Advocacy journalism has a long and honorable tradition in this country, and if it weren’t for advocacy, there would have been no voice to oppose slavery, to champion women’s suffrage, to end discrimination against Blacks, and Gays, and on and on. How do we DO IT? Guys—how do we balance our “objective” journalist selves with our human (si, se puede), advocate selves? The eternal struggle… comments???
(Luis—you did nothing wrong. You felt, passionately. That is good. You just have to be sure to keep that in line what your news organizataion expects from you vis a vis coverage.... some News orgs don’t allow reporters to participate in rallies, to do political work for particular candidate, etc. Others do. Just know your bos/ news org.) Thoughts? Examples> Struggles? 
(what you’re doing sounds v. exciting)

Elvia asked me a similar question and I answered:

Elvia-

At Arizona State I had to cover Joe Arpaio who is the self-proclaimed “Toughest Sheriff.” This experience taught me that objectivity was simple because the feeling of trying to report a story fairly and accurately while meeting deadline, always championed personal emotion.

But immigration has been my beat and my semi-area of expertise for so long that I’m growing tired of the hateful rhetoric. I talk frankly about these issues with everyone including my editor. Not to mention that in working for the Link, I have experience a re-wakening of cultural awareness and appreciation

--My comment is...I love journalism too much to compromise objectivity, but I refuse to keep my voice quiet when an issue is this big and this personal. This is why I told Elvia, “I talk frankly about these things...”

Luis, Elivia et al—please let’s post other examples of our feel like “not wanting to compromise objectivity .... but refusing to give up our emotional investment....”

I had such an experience (working on a multimedia piece on it now, after all these years) in 1987 (YES SHE IS THAT OLD!) when the Pope came to visit San Francisco, whcih at that time was being devastated by the early “plague-years” of AIDS. The Vatican soundly denounces homosexuality and sex outside of marriage, so, in general, the gay community there was placed in the “sinner” position by that institutional belief system. Even so, the Pope came to visit, and his carefully orchestrated (by the Vatican) stop overs included a brief talk with people with AIDS, including a few gays, women, children and others who had constraced HIV thru blood transfusions, etc. This was a very emotional story for me, as I had to keep in check my anger at the Vatican for basically turning a blind eye to the spread of HIV-AIDS in that crucial time, when there was little medical research being funded, and people dying all over the place.

I got thru it, objectively.
Today, all these years later, I am doing a MM piece that takes a seriuosly critical (opinion-piece) look at what happened back then, what the Vatican and the Reagan administration and the media did and did not do, etc.

Keep the emoiton fired up! Just keep it in check in the delivery ....

The latest saga in my objectivity dilemma— I was made editor of our news weekly. This last edition relied heavily on me to provide content, pictures and stories. This was the edition with the march—and also the edition that had ONE BIG MISTAKE. I posted a picture of actress thinking it was my friend who contributed an Op/Ed reflection. I was preoccupied with my columns and stories that I didn’t bother double-checking. No excuse being editor for two weeks is addressing my biggest flaw—pay attention to details kid, pay attention to details.
But once we went to print, with a huge error still pending correction, I had the rally ethical issue to deal with.
When I told my editor how I felt about covering the march he told me he would have the reporters right a personal Op/Ed on how it was to be a journalist, most of us Hispanic, covering the march. The former editor of the Link had this to say:

“Hey charlie, nice issue, but I have a big problem with having reporters express their personal feelings like they did in that section on covering the rally. we have spent way way way too much time and energy telling the major media of the world that we can cover things objectively, and the latino press continue to try to convince them that we can be just as unbiased as they supposedly are, and that we can and should be taken seriously. we certainly don’t need reporters saying that they shouted si se puede at the rally, especially if they are wearing press credentials like veronica was. this certainly can’t be used for future clips as any editor would wonder if their potential reporter would be able to stay out of the story. 
these kind of personal expressions would get reporters yanked off the story, or worse, fired, anywhere else. imagine the uproar if a bunch of white reporters waxed enthusiastically about covering an anti-war rally or a tea party rally or even this immigration rally. as an editor i would take them off that assignment immediately and emphasize the importance of STAYING OUT OF THE STORY. 
and i remind you that the link can lose its congressional credential(s) with these types of personal expressions outside of a column. 
these kids are young and need your guidance on this so they won’t venture out into the world thinking this is a good idea, because it most certainly is not.”

This is a really interesting discussion. As a journalist you want to maintain neutrality in the events that you are assigned to cover. I think it’s great to be passionate toward a cause, as long as we don’t mix personal passion with professional obligation (rules obviously differ if you’re an opinion/editorial writer like Nicholas Kristof).

If we’re covering a certain type of event for a news organization that we know we have strong feelings toward, it might be a good idea disclose that to the editor before covering the event. That way, we have that extra bit of accountability so someone else can try to make sure we don’t editorialize a piece that should lack our opinion.

Any other thoughts on this? Good topic, Luis.

assignment immediately and emphasize the importance of STAYING OUT OF THE STORY

Luis et al—this, the above that the editor said about the march issues, would make a good story—a good op ed. How to Stay out of the Story. It could be about just what Luis has been describing here: Historically, the ethnic media has been an advocacy media. And they have played that role in the community, vis a vis community issues. But you are so right—“objectivity”—total fairness, non-advocacy, is what we are aiming for. Good op-ed for you to write!

Ashley.M.M. - 06 April 2010 10:19 PM

If we’re covering a certain type of event for a news organization that we know we have strong feelings toward, it might be a good idea disclose that to the editor before covering the event. That way, we have that extra bit of accountability so someone else can try to make sure we don’t editorialize ...

Ashley et al—this is a great point. If you are emotionally involved (we can’t help it sometimes), let your editor know...talk about it. Be transparent. Good point.