Like most of the top-tier government jobs in Bangladesh, the journalism industry in the country is also an amalgamated field — overcrowded with people with degrees from any faculties but Journalism.

 

Often many of them don’t even have a graduation yet they are greatly plying through with their career. Good news!

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For a certain period, I was very skeptical about this trend. Later as I aged while the wick of my experience burned maturely, I realised this is a type of job that requires more first-hand experience than of one can collect academically. I thought I was wrong.

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But again, after a few active years on the field, I watched many colleagues around me were twisting and desecrating stories to fit in their utopian plots and description. And not to my surprise, most of these rulebreakers came from non-journalism alma maters.

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I was taught an entire year of Ethics at the J-school I studied for my bachelors. Though after the very first lecture in the school, where I learnt the 5Ws and H, I thought ‘Damn! Is that all I need to know? What will I do in the next few years?’

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The ethics lectures were very confusing and cerebrally anguishing. An entire year for it turned out to be a great blessing at the end of that academic term. I also studied law while doing the degree, understanding most of the pitfalls, apexes and abysses of the judiciary reporting.

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Those are some of the topics one is required to learn. Academically, I guess. Self-enlightenment is surely a great thing. But often one needs to pursue knowledge that is being carried on from a generation to the next. These are classic rule of thumb.

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I remember working as a translator for a reputed journalist few years ago. While she requested me to ask an open-ended query, I misunderstood her requirement and went with a yes/no question. After couple of such bad mistakes, she realised my fault and was annoyed and ran through the entire questionnaire — word by word — with me, before I asked those out loud to our interviewee. Because, one, as a reporter, does not inject his/her bias into the subject to create a juicy story.

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I have often seen journalists tell their subjects traumatising stories that would perhaps make them uncomfortable. The sole output of such evil attempts is to bring either a drop of tear or fear in the subject’s eyes.

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Can you feel how cruel that is? Refraining from such heinous crimes should be trained professionally. In our country, with all due respect, most of the top universities produce journalists every year.

 

Though often I question how many of these unis’ J-school professors have had good runs on the field before ending up squeezing in red-inked pens on test papers of aspiring journos?

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The number, unfortunately, is awfully low.

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Please do research properly before heading out to collect your next story. Strongly ask your conscience; whether you need a few claps and pats on the back or a deep scar in the hind of your mind for chewing up through one’s fearful traumatised experience s/he would fight hard to forget..

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And yes, if you are intending to be a journalist, get a J-degree while surfing through a plethora of books, articles and case studies on ethics which are also available online these days to make life easier.

 

This is super important.

 

Please do that before entering into this thankless profession and save the dignity newsmen usually uphold.

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SAM JAHAN, Journalist

 

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