Friday, May 29, 2009

The Ethical Journalist

My father has been in a tiny Russian town for the past few days and just got back on Skype for the first time in a while this morning. We were catching up and he said he had just finished an interview with someone from the New York Times.

Coincidentally, I had just finished an article in the New York Times by a certain reporter at the UN who makes a habit of being very unethical in his reporting. He never identifies himself, he snoops and eavesdrops, and he is what I call a garbage collector. What makes me very upset is that he made front page of the International news section today with an article I suggested to him back in October. In fact, I gave a whole statement about how climate change affects low lying island nations in second committee. Yeah, that's right, cause I used to be somebody.

There are words for people like him. This is not that kind of a blog.

I also may have mentioned in the context of ensuring people behave morally and ethically my desire to join the marines.

My father said, "Don't go from a serious discussion about relative versus absolute to absolute rubbish." When I told him I had been seriously considering it as an option for many months, he followed up with, "Seems like a particularly anti-intellectual endeavor for an intellectual young person. Unless you want to be an astronaut."

I take that to mean he does not want me to join the reserves... Thanks Dad, opinion noted.

For the record, I do want to be an astronaut. Space is cool. But I am afraid of heights. Fail.

Thanks for reading and best regards,
Alya

1 comments:

Emily Norton said...

marines are astronauts?