Monday Musings: An epitaph to Journalism
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By Amitabh Srivastava , Edited By Adam Rizvi, The India Observer, TIO: As we come to a tumultuous year year ending 2024, the most haunting and disturbing issue for me as a journalist and child rights activist this year was a picture of children killed in a hospital in a bombing on Gaza Hospital, which was not published by the New York Times.
The picture showed the bodies of children lying on the floor, covered with a white sheet so that parents could come and take them away for burial.
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But later the sheet had either been removed by a gush of wind or by a photographer of the publication, most likely the later.
As I came to know from the horses mouth itself, the Editorial Board of NYT had a meeting lasting several hours which then decided against using the picture as they felt it was too gory.
With my 45 years of experience in journalism beginning with the emergency, I felt it was an unethical decision as journalists are expected to expose the truth honestly unless it is an AI inspired picture.
To express my strong views on the matter I wrote a piece on the matter which I would like to share here.
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An Epitaph to Journalism
(It lies buried here)
These little angels were bombed while they were in the safest abode-a hospital
The sight was truly unnerving and someone from the Hospital covered the bodies of these children. Probably they were hoping that their parents or relatives would identify them carry them away for burial
Most likely they would have mourned for them privately.
But the photographers on the spot did not like the idea of carrying a picture with the faces covered. It did not convey the message.
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How could they?
They were probably hoping to bag the Best Picture Award.
And so they opened up the faces but what they saw shocked them.
The children looked in deep peaceful slumber and even dreaming as their smile indicated.
Until you noticed the Blood and the missing part of the skull.
But the real bosses, the newspaper Editors refused to use the picture calling it too gory.
And the coveted picture did not convey the Fear, the Trauma, the last minute gasps for breath.
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And so the war continues happily and we wait for another occasion, another bombing.
Or better still let’s hope for a shooting from close quarters for a better shoot.
And what for me what adds to the misery is that not a single child rights NGO in India or activist, and there are thousands of them, raised their voice against these deaths of children.
So much so that even Prime Minister Narendra Modi had to express his sorrow when during his visit to Russia Putin had bombed Gaza in which children had died.
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And even as we in the media try to cover up these dreadful images instead of covering them even as reports tell us that 1,94,000 children have been killed in the Israel Gaza war and thousands in Ukraine.
And now we are on the threshold of a New Year as new players like Donald Trump have been elected to preside over our Destiny.
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Curated and Compiled by Humra Kidwai
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