all the baby elephants in this room

I recently found Gillian Anderson’s recommended booklist online, and I think that she has pretty good taste, so I decided to start chipping away at her book picks.

(Fangirl note…this is Gillian Anderson…she’s kind of my hero)

After three years of high school disillusionment, I’m starting to like reading again. Awesome and sad, because as a child, I loved to read. I read all the time. Some kids got in trouble for flushing paper clips down the toilet; I read during class. Nerd? In probably more ways than one.

I started with this one. It’s called Bel Canto by Ann Patchett. I figured that since it had a couple music (opera!) undertones, I might find it interesting. Because really, who writes about opera?

This book. This book…dear Lord. So beautiful. I’m only halfway through it, and it’s my new favorite. It’s about violence and terrorism and the intrinsic beauty and goodness that can arise out of human beings. Go read it. Drop what you’re doing and go out and buy it. Now.

With that said, I get to my point (way down here, I know). Roxane Coss, the soprano in the story, makes a reference to a social experiment in the middle of the story. I read it on the bus today on the way back from downtown DC to George Mason, and it made me think a little bit. And this is a stretch, undoubtedly fueled by four days of little sleep, but what happens when you shove a bunch of strangers in a room together and make them interact? It’s not too different from what’s happened here at WJMC.

During my past four days here (and this is just four days) with this group of about two hundred kids here and a handful of advisors, I’ve realized that we’ve already mapped each other out, sorted each other into categories: people I like, people I don’t like, people I want to talk to, etc. By the second full day here, groups were pretty much established…an unwritten set of rules was written. And I’m not necessarily saying that any of this is wrong. That’s just the way things tend to work out.

Now, my personality…I suppose I’m a pretty outgoing person…not quite leader material. I’m more of a witness. I see things, hear things. People’s personalities are so interesting…throw a bunch of them in a room together, and you’ve got some amazing energy you can harness. Just from my group this week (the group of the awesome and revered T-Py), I’ve already seen some interesting people.

There’s the strong personalities, the leaders, the slightly crazy people who always seem to make some sense. There’s a couple of rebels, people who’d rather go down fighting than retract one of their opinions. They’re variety. They sway the group ever so slightly to the side. There’s the introverts, those who don’t mind being a little bit different and are by no means acquiesing. With one well-thought-out sentence, they send the majority’s decision flying out the window. And then there’s the peacemakers, people who sit in the middle of the group, keeping all the energy outward so that it doesn’t turn inward and self-destruct.

It’s the weirdest, most ridiculous combination of people, and without knowing anything about human nature, you’d find it strange that we didn’t rip each other to shreds the minute we met. But there’s so much maturity in this group of people. There is compromise, questioning, inclusion, even though we’re different. And yeah, we’re far from the group of the most perfect kids on the block, but I love this group of people. I love that they care outside themselves, that they really know what they’re talking about.

I don’t know. Human nature continues to surprise me, even with something as simple as this. Because the fact that something like this can work is a little bit of a miracle…I think so, anyway.

Author’s Note: This was typed up and ready to be posted last night, but the system wasn’t working…just in case my timeline makes no sense.

It’s 11:05 PM DC time right now, and there’s nothing I’d like more than to go to bed, but I’m going to type this instead. Because I have a lot to say after today, and I have to admit that there’s something very Carrie Bradshaw-like of me typing on my laptop (Harold, I call him…that’s a story for another time) in the late hours of the night.

And, before anyone slams me for that reference, I really like Carrie. She’s a personality, to be sure. And she has a lot to say. People listen to her, real and fictional, and that’s something.

This blog doesn’t focus on my trip–though I really could type for hours and hours and hours (which is why I probably shouldn’t use this blog for that purpose…there’s not enough time here as it is). I tend to be very thorough. Trip information is most likely going to be posted here when I get home. If this blog still exists then, I’ll leave the entries public and link them here.

This blog is going to focus on what I’m learning, what I’m seeing, and, as you can see from the title, maybe a few things that people don’t want to talk about but should…if not now, certainly soon.

I begin with an article. This article, to be exact, given to my by my honors algebra 2/trig teacher (shoutout to Mrs. Stasio!) on the first or second day of class. We were to read it as part of the homework. And I have to say, I was rather indignant the first time I read it–so indignant that I went to bed thinking about it, woke up thinking about it, spent the day thinking about it…because it’s a harsh viewpoint. Reading it, I felt like yet another Santa-like structure in my life was tumbling down.

It wasn’t until two days later that I realized I felt this way because the article was true.

That was, of course, everything I’d been told when I was young: “You can do anything you want if you set your mind to it. Follow your dreams, and they’ll come true.” My parents. My teachers. Every Disney movie ever made.

Now, I’m not going to call that statement an outright lie, because I’m sure there are several people in the world who followed that advice and were rewarded handsomely. Several more took that advice and ended up only a little more than couple steps from where they started.

This is where the natural defense mechanism kicks in, the “Fine, they just didn’t try hard enough…believe enough. But me, I’m one person! I control myself! I’m stronger than that!”

Have any of you ever experienced a high school theater audition?

Here’s what you see: several (let’s go with ten for this example…a nice, easy, visual number) people standing in line in odd costumes that they threw together in the past week or so (because besides the audition cut they’ve been given, they don’t know too much else about their desired character), positively quivering with a mixture of nervousness, hope, fear, and ambition. Add to that the fact that they’re all teenagers, and life and death basically hangs on every moment, and at that moment, no room’s ever held so much heart.

You want to tell me that nine of them aren’t trying hard enough…that nine of them aren’t believing enough?

I lived, for a while after reading this article, in a little place of self-satisfied cynicism. The fact that I had been disillusioned my whole life was someone else’s fault! I was disappointed, but very much relieved that I could be justified in blaming my parents, my teachers—everyone but myself.

This was not the point. It is true that the world is not handed to anyone. That’s something everyone needs to learn. One person is not more important than the other. This became crystal clear to me as I argued with my mother several times about career choices. We’re in a recession. There’s no denying that. There’s no quick fix. Deal with it.

The world is changing. People in relatively secure lifestyles are getting the rugs pulled out from under their feet. Education is getting more demanding. People use technology to advance in evil as well as good. It is just now becoming clear—after several years of warning—that we do, in fact, have to take responsibility for our environment. I remember learning about recycling and pollution ten years ago, and no one was paying attention. Now everyone’s hopping on the bandwagon because it’s the “cool” thing to do.

Nothing is stable anymore, and it’s undeniably scary.

The natural response, I find, in the face of a lot of change, is retreat. Shocked, quick retreat to material comforts, to tradition, to an idealized version of the world that offers comfort. It’s understandable. Fight or flight. Go back to the familiar.

And yet, it is our generation—my generation. The generation that is proclaimed both (in theory) the bright future and (on the ten o’clock news) the future downfall of society. We are the ones who must live with the future—whatever is handed to us. And it is us who have risen up—within our communities, online, around the world—to try and regain control of our future. One by one, we realize that, unlike older generations, we can’t afford to be arrogant. Our education, our careers, our families are up in the air right now, and it’s going to take something unconventional to get them back down. We recognize that our stability is gone, and that reverting solely to tradition is not going to help us. We have to push forward, go into the unknown, try out some things, make some mistakes, and—heaven forbid—fail several times before we get to where we need to go.

Not that it’s too much to worry about—judging from what I’ve seen, we don’t give up easily.

Lately, I’m not just told to change the world. I’m told how. The ideal and hopeful expectation of my youth is becoming more and more concrete every day. I, we, have a responsibility. Fix it. Less and less of my friends are content to sit by and hope the world better. They do. They speak. They act. They plan. We unite together, a force that shouldn’t be written off just yet.

Just because we’re young doesn’t mean we’re wrong.

Yesterday, we had an awesome opening speech by Brian Lamb, the CEO of C-SPAN. I got a lovely candid shot of him after his speech was over.

He asked us a bunch of interesting questions and when he was finished, I realized that we’d actually run the discussion (I know, right?), and since I spent part of the address being faint of heart and not raising my hand (and I’m a much better thinker when I’m writing than I ever am when I’m talking), I’m going to answer the questions here:

Why are you here (at WJMC)?
My being here at WJMC has come about as most events in life do, partially by fate and partially by choice. Being on the journalism staff at school has opened my eyes to the world around me and to myself, so when I received an invitation for WJMC, I knew that I needed to go and see where this certain aspect of my life is going. I honestly don’t know much about the field of journalism, and I wanted to hear about it from people who do and from my peers. I find that both forms of advice are valuable. I’m also considering this is as something to further study or even possibly do as a career. I do have a few issues with the field, ethics-wise and career-wise, so I’m hoping that I’ll get some clarity from this conference. More than anything, I’m hoping to be pushed a little out of my comfort zone. I find that’s always good for a person, because that’s the only way she can grow. 🙂

What’s your definition of journalism?
I never actually stopped to think about this before. I see journalism as spreading one’s best vision of the truth to others to provide a greater physical, mental, emotional, and (possibly) spiritual understanding of the world around them.

What’s your favorite news source? (And, since this follow-up is inevitable, why?)
I end up watching a variety of news sources, but I think CNN is my favorite…not that it doesn’t have its flaws. FOX is usually on in my house, because that’s what my mom likes to watch, but lately, they’ve just seemed really mean. Not that I’m hard to please or anything. I get lots of my news off Twitter–I have a bunch of feeds into there. It just depends on what I happen to read/listen to/see that day.

What are your goals here at WJMC?
Hmm…goals. Setting goals is scary for me because I tend to be really hard on myself if I don’t reach them. But let’s see…by the end of this week, I hope to have learned more about journalism, taken some leadership opportunities, made this blog into a lovely wordsy bonanza, and (hopefully) have a podcast for you guys to keep and blackmail me with in the future.

Not that I’m endorsing blackmail or anything. ^^

What do you think about Facebook as journalism?
Facebook is awesome. And I’m not just saying that because I’m a teenager with way too much to say to my friends. I mean, Facebook can be that if you want it to be, but it has the potential to be so much more. I love the fact that adults are taking advantage of that.

A particular incident that comes to mind is the night of the presidential elections. While Obama and McCain were showing down all over the country, all of my friends were talking politics online. I believe I had a conversation with two people I barely knew…and it went late into the night. It’s good that people–especially my generation–are caring about politics, because we’re going to grow up someday and have to take responsibility for the country we live in. It’s a good start.

Where do you think journalism is going?
That’s such a hard question to answer. To the internet, most definitely. I’m not so sure about the fate of newspapers…I think that they’re going to be around for a while longer, but I can see journalism becoming a completely online thing. I think it’s going to take a long time for that to happen, though, because there’s a comfort factor to opening the newspaper over your breakfast. And we humans…we tend to like material comforts.

Who controls the media?
One of the most beautiful and scary things about free speech…we do. The internet has opened up so many more opportunities to express what we think. Does that raise issues? Like you wouldn’t believe. The potential for evil comes with the potential for good, but using the media in a positive way is such a powerful force.