When I checked with them today, few of my journalism students had heard of the murder of Turkish journalist Hrant Dink. I had put his name on their current affairs pop quiz. Now they know. But, this isn’t to chastise my students. We talked, in fact, about why they didn’t know – the students were oh-so-ready to blame themselves, for not waking early in the morning, for only reading trashy news, for being so, so bad. That’s what we’ve done to our youth today – made them feel bad,powerless,incapable... for something we have done to them ourselves. We dumbed down their media. And sent them to seek cover in their own space – My Space and Facebook. Hrant Dink and Orhan Pamuk aren’t on our front pages.
My journalism students should know about a slain journalist. They should know about what happens to journalists in other parts of the world when they raise questions that challenge nationalism. And, they should know that while some men and women are dying for the right to free speech, others aren’t quite exercising it.
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