45 days.
45 days of school.
45 days of waking up at 5am.
45 days of budgeting & stressing over bills/food.
45 DAYS.
Honestly it feels as if i've been in S.F for far more longer than just a month. School, work, club meetings, counseling appointments and massive amounts of reading assignments have been keeping me busy 24/7.
It isn't a bad thing of course to be busy all the time, but it's just crazy to sit down one day out of your busy week on a gray, sad looking, smelly couch (thanks gassy roommates!) & realize WOW. It has only been just a little over a month that I have done all the grown up crap.
I N S A N E.
So far, this school year has been great! I've learned more about my school & the resources that are available to me. Investigating programs/organizations that will help me thrive in pursuing a career in journalism. I find it interesting that once as I started becoming active within the school community, an intimidation for individuals (peers, professors, & counselors) started to develop in me. This intimidation did stop me from building connections with famous journalists such as Steve Dorsey, a guest speaker in my Journalism 200 class. At that moment I realized that this anxious feeling that was stopping me from reaching out to individuals was going to hold me back from even progressing in becoming a journalist.
A journalist needs to be able to communicate with people.
A journalist is for the people.
A journalist investigates & does so by reaching out to people, creating connections.
This epiphany pushed me to strive in becoming "people friendly" by getting over this nonsense intimidation that had built within me.
It's honestly "mind fucking" how sometimes individuals that hold a strong title to their name can be the most down to earth individuals.
Just the other day, I met up personally with both my advisor for the journalism department & professor for my journalism 200 class. At first glance, they both seemed very intimidating to me, especially with their doctorate degree hanging above their heads & flashy "Berkley" "Stanford" alumni merchandise.
Yet right when I started to communicate with them of my goals in becoming a journalism and obstacles that I am facing. They instantly became my personal hype group and cheerleading squad. Honestly it was heartwarming, I felt at home which is hard to feel when I am actually away from home.
The boost of enthusiasm from these mentors have pushed me to take my awareness of societal issues into far more depth.
Our information of any issue comes from any sort of medium: social media, newspapers, magazines, podcasts, radios, etc.
However do people really consider the point of view they are trying to highlight?
Whether if it's a structural or episodic view in which a story is being portrayed on a certain issue?
In other words, is the story being told through the lens of a character that most individuals can relate to? A mother figure, sibling figure, economically poor individual, etc?
or
Is it being told through no objective point of view?
The most recent story of the Dakota Pipeline is a great example to consider these factors. There isn't much information of the certain issue. It took me quite a bit of time to find recent updates of the events taking place at the work site in North Dakota. Other than the primary information of the start of all this mess, which you can read up on here.
So far, i've read up on structural views which have little to no information of the new update of the 20-23 protestors (inaccurate numbers within all the published articles) charged of various "assaults" done to the armed forces. It's rather just stating a fact, not listing the causes climaxing to the action of incarceration.
Most commonly seen within these articles is the only mention of a protestor being on horseback, illustrating a more violent prone image compared to an officer on feet. However the twist in this scenario is rather than speaking of the weapons used for threatening purposes (in this case the officer possessed) these readings choose to highlight the sole image of the protestor on the horse.
Of course the images used in mostly all of these articles were images from the protestors themselves. Giving themselves credibility for being harmless over the whole situation and trying to avoid the most possible violent exchange with the police force.
Do we trust then the non objective view for news or do we look into the different episodic news from both sides for our own evaluation of the whole situation?
Do we grasp on to more detail about the whole scenario this way?
I have yet to read more about the side of Bakken & Three Forks production on their push for the pipeline in all honesty. The main reason that I haven't lurked into this point of view in depth is because i'm exposed to the point of view of the people rather than huge corporations in conflicts through my ethnics class.
On that note.
I'm going to research more on this matter about the Dakota Access Pipeline to see far beyond the highlighted conflict media illustrates.
Until then, here are some sites/videos of these groups views on the whole situation.
Protestors:
https://youtu.be/rfVCKXnZu58
https://youtu.be/haGFaOE0uoY
https://youtu.be/U8Uwo6ZAEG4
Oil companies:
http://www.daplpipelinefacts.com/
http://www.ogfj.com/articles/print/volume-10/issue-12/features/three-forks-vs-bakken.html
¡¡Hasta Luego!!
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