A journalist came to the UO to speak about sex and sex in the media. I went thinking, "Great. Yet another lecture about how the media screws up sex and sensationalizes it. I know this," and left thinking "Benoit actually had some good tips on how to go beyond the typical media coverage."
Covering sex in a non-sensationalist way begins with being thoughtful about it. Then it takes months of immersing yourself in the people's lives to actually understand their perspective and experience before you can begin writing about sex and sexuality from a non-mainstream angle.
I wonder though, does it also take having a similar sexual orientation?
Benoit didn't come out and say he was gay until at least 2/3 of the way through his lecture, and it was in a passing reference to his surprise at 11 and 12-year olds coming out when he didn't even know he was gay until college. Benoit has won numerous awards for his coverage of different gay communities, from gay teens to married black men who have gay affairs to Midwestern towns that change street names because of their gay connotations. Throughout his lecture I wondered, does his own sexual orientation make him uniquely able to cover gay America? In some ways, I think of his reporting and coverage as more accurate because I have to believe he would take something so personal seriously enough to get it right. But at the same time, I wonder if his personal attachment to the story might bias the way he goes about reporting, seeking sources and even how he interviews people.
I wondered the implications for myself and journalism as a whole. Surely journalists aren't Objective in the sense that they talk to everyone equally, seek out everyone with the same sort of intensity. Even in my limited experience, I know that sometimes, okay more than I would like to admit, I don't try as hard to talk to a source as I do to others in the story. I have never not tried to talk to someone, but I have called others repeatedly, damn near stalked them, because I wanted their voice in the story. Also, I will spend more time with some sources because I want to cultivate a relationship with them, and I don't necessarily spend that same amount of extra qualitative time with others.
So again, I wonder the implications of journalists covering stories that have relevancy to their personal lives. I certainly don't have an answer. But I know that the stories I cover where I have had some previous, personal experience with the concept, are the ones that I'm better able to report on because I know where to go, who to talk to, and most importantly, have authority/legitimacy in the sources' view because of my own personal connection.
An example: in the recent ODE coverage about The Insurgent and the Newman Center (a Catholic campus ministry), I told members of the center that I was raised Catholic, but no longer practiced. I made it clear that I wasn't there to debate the issue in the story, or even to give my opinion, but was drawn into a conversation about Catholicism anyway because of my experience with it.
I suspect that as this story unfolds, the person I chatted with will be more willing to pro-actively call me and tell me what's up from his perspective because of this first conversation about the Church. Perhaps that will translate to breaking a story ahead of other media outlets. But, I still wonder if that was the right thing to do.
Back to Benoit. His stories have provided a much more in-depth and thoughtful look at gay communities around the country, has shown that gay people are not weird freaks that live in closests on another planet. His stories humanize our neighbors, children and community members, and in doing so, enrich our understanding of our society.
But what about journalists covering stories that echo in their personal lives?
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