Vaneisa: The People in Print—the problem with T&T’s media

One of many panel discussions on the latest Bocas Lit Fest targeted on the destiny of newspaper columnists in right this moment’s surroundings. Themed “They Don’t Write Them Like They Used to: A Dialogue on the Current and Way forward for the Newspaper Column,” it ended up with a slightly bleak prognosis.

Among the many signs of its malaise was the final decline in newspaper readership; the rise in social media platforms as sources of stories and knowledge; the will for brief articles (titbits actually); and, a surfeit of columnists writing on the identical topics with little variation in method.

All legitimate observations. Know-how has had a heavy hand in redirecting consideration spans and existence.

We don’t must recreate the world that when was, however we will attempt to recapture these components that had been significant. Reality is, some issues are timeless and priceless, and don’t have anything to do with the evolving types of know-how.

We have now a lot data at our fingertips, however do we all know the right way to course of it?

However that’s not what I wish to have a look at; my focus for now’s newspapers.

It is perhaps odd for individuals to affiliate the present Guardian newspaper with the richest tradition of nice Caribbean writing in its options sections. Opinions of all kinds had been common—books, movies, artwork, theatre—the standard was very good; even the social occasions had been handled with finesse.

I don’t recall meals and eating places occupying any considerable house, however that will have been a mirrored image of the time.

I’ve an intimate information of the content material of the paper from its inception, having helped to compile its exhibition to mark its seventy fifth anniversary within the early Nineties.

Reviewers knew what they had been writing about, and so they wrote generally scathing, generally adulatory articles that gave context and a basic appreciation of the character of the themes underneath scrutiny.

They had been edifying, to say the least; under no circumstances just like the press releases coming from the individuals who put their work on show and know that until they ship out one thing, they might by no means hope for discerning protection.

So, we get notices that issues have occurred, not critiques. This can be a disservice to the humanities, and one purpose why individuals are not fascinated with studying.

Whereas it might be true that individuals are studying newspapers much less, I think they’re nonetheless studying, simply discovering their topics of curiosity for themselves. They don’t must take what the newspapers deem to be worthy of consideration, they will select to seek for what they need.

It appears to me that the newspapers must reconfigure themselves, taking into consideration that the information they current is hardly unique, and what would make them stand out is the standard of their options. On this class, I embody columnists.

A few years in the past, when Kathy Ann Waterman (now Justice Waterman-Latchoo) turned editor-in-chief on the Trinidad Categorical, she set about radically shifting the thrust of the newspaper’s method to protection.

Her thought was that the core of every part that was to be written ought to concentrate on individuals, the way it affected them and what their lives had been about.

It was to me, the golden years of the Categorical. Good author that she is, Kathy Ann understood that finally, sensitivity to the circumstances surrounding ourselves led to deeper understanding and empathy, and other people might determine with tales that had been additionally theirs.

I’ve by no means understood why that initiative busted. In hindsight, I determine that it was too unpalatable for the standard previous boys to abdomen.

I recall that one editor had referred to my very own inclination in the direction of that method as “mushy”. Newspapers, like a lot else in our wretched societies, have been outlined in minds that can’t budge from outdated notions.

That psychological stodginess is well accountable for the rise of the quacks who provide opinions which can be so devoid of intelligence that one could be tempted to see them as makes an attempt at buffoonery had been it not for the chilling penalties.

How else does one clarify the continued existence of the Minister of Nationwide Safety?

Or the echo of his concern about our nationwide picture being sullied within the feedback of a columnist who referred to the “appalling lack of patriotism” from residents who “defend foreigners who got down to denigrate and demean their very own nation”—as if to say that the actions highlighted don’t exist besides inside seditious minds.

Freedom of speech is to be supported. With out it, we’re susceptible to the whims of these wielding energy.

To return again to the problem of newspaper columnists and the feedback that there are too many repeating the identical issues; it’s price making the purpose that newspapers have succumbed to the decision of the monetary backside line and like to have retirees writing free of charge, slightly than spend money on individuals who even have fascinating issues to say.

Marina Salandy-Brown, who had moderated the panel dialogue, invoked one among our nice former newspaper columnists, Jeremy Taylor, to outline one of the best traits: good high quality writing, contemporary thought, one thing price saying, being knowledgeable, and the capability to inform the reality, even about themselves.

She additionally identified that columnists are cautious due to the worry of backlash. I do know that the savagery of social media posts has made many worthy writers reluctant to show themselves.

It’s worse now that they might additionally must deal with the opportunity of sedition costs. Sigh.

Vaneisa Baksh is a columnist with the Trinidad Categorical, an editor and a cricket historian. She is the creator of a biography of Sir Frank Worrell.