A Heart of Gold

On Friday I received a phone call from a reporter at the New York Times who was doing an investigation into the types of documentaries and stories that would be coming out of New Orleans in reaction to the flood. She’d gotten my name from someone who thought I may have some insight into this subject since the assignments our camera crews were receiving are indicative of the nature of programming that would be forthcoming. In the course of our conversation she posed a question that I touched upon in my very first post: the curious nature of profiting from someone else’s (or in some cases an entire population’s) misery. This sort of misery profiteering doesn’t really apply to the staff reporter or crew in the field, but it does apply to freelance television crews and the networks themselves (who profit from increased ad revenue). While the staff of a media outfit is paid every day no matter what the news cycle, the freelance crews that make up the bulk of the workforce in network television (especially out in the field) depend on big news events in their region for business. From a purely profit standpoint there nothing as lucrative to a freelancer in this business as a nearby natural disaster, hostage stand-off, or celebrity trial. Texas being a big state, we are host to numerous such events in the course of any given year. Whether it is an Oprah Winfrey trial in Amarillo, a religious sect holed up in Waco compound, an exploding space shuttle in Hunstville, a soldier’s mother living in a tent on the side of a Crawford road, or a hurricane next door, Texas gets more than its fair share of tragedy and nonsense.

But while I have sometimes felt a twinge of guilt about referring to the shuttle tragedy as a Brinks truck and Cindy Sheehan as a cash cow, in this particular situation my feelings are a bit less cynical. Often times what we do is exploitive, sensational, or in most cases, ridiculous. I have had that moment while asking Julia Roberts who designed her dress or Chuck Norris what the key to Walker Texas Ranger’s popularity was, when I couldn’t believe this is what I do for a living. I tell anyone who will listen, that television programs are simply filler between commercials and commercials are the point of television (which is probably why we’re not qualified to shoot those) and that the content is dictated strictly by the bad taste of the majority of Americans. Remember, that majority is who shops at Wal-Mart, elects George W. Bush President, and makes the Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes relationship front-page news – it’s not my fault if they want to watch crap. I have to earn a living too. We in this business are whores – willing to cover any story if the client is willing to foot the bill. Let’s face it – we have children to feed.

And even when we are covering real news stories, we often do so from a safe distance, able to separate ourselves behind the walls of a comfortable Courtyard by Marriott, or by swooping in after the fact when there are nothing but pieces to pick up and tears to jerk. But in New Orleans the media (including our crews) was there from the beginning, stuck in floodwaters and scavenging for bottled water with everyone else. The first crew we sent in had no idea what to expect (like the people living there) and they suffered because of that. Still they didn’t ask to come home. There was sense that what they were doing was important. The news that came out in those first days was the only truth anyone heard. The government was still saying everything was okay while the cameras were showing pregnant women on rooftops and reporters described gun-toting gangs in the streets. Unlike September 11th when we were attacked by a foreign threat, the devastation of the New Orleans floods can be blamed on our own government – a truth far more harrowing. For the first time in a long time, the media was not sensationalizing a story – telling us that something was important when it wasn’t. They were giving us the news – providing us the information we needed so that we could demand the action that needed to be taken. They were, quite simply, doing their job.

And so I will add an addendum to my earlier assertion that we in this business are whores. Yes, we are whores – but we are whores with hearts of gold. And even though it is most of the time, it is not always about the Benjamins.