Or, how we say in México… no es lo mismo Juana que Chana.
CNYlink, the website that hosts articles from the local weekly newspaper “Syracuse City Eagle,” has a space to leave comments on each of their articles, but apparently if they don’t like them… they will just erase them. I have left two, and they are missing.
Nancy Keefe Rhodes wrote about a ceremony for the launching of a great initiave to support the arts called Arts Covenant. I pointed out a seemingly small, but nevertheless personally important, error. Ms. Keefe wrote that La Liga was among the organizations attending, when in fact nobody from that organization was present or aknowledged during the ceremony. A group of 5 volunteers from the non-profit radio program Nosotros, Tu Voz Latina was there. One of them, professor Beatriz Salcedo-Strumpf, even spoke about the program, but Ms. Rhodes, who wrote the names of many of the attendees (politicians, representatives from this or that) and artists, etc. assumed anyways that the Latinos present were from La Liga. Because, where else can they be from, right?
And so, I thought: Ok, a little mistake. They will just correct it. I first contact the journalist. She doesn’t like how I go about it. I tested her knowledge of local Latino organizations (there are not that many!..) and she failed. She doesn’t address the issue and instead goes the route of the ad hominen..
Then..I found out she de-friended me from her list on facebook… I am still in shock! She just took her marbles and left. Ok.. we aren’t friends anymore.. ( I am looking for a support group to deal with this!) But she is still a journalist and will have to correct the mistake, because that is what good journalists and newspapers do when they get it wrong.. (I bet even the pennysaver does that)
But NO, instead the article in the CNYlink website now simply doesn’t mention La Liga. Do they own it and write instead who was actually there??? NO. no explanation. Either they just don’t know who was there (I told them) or Ms. Keefe took it personally…
This is a bad example of ethics in journalism. Isn’t correcting mistakes the most simple way of building trust with your readership? The article is printed in the current edition of the Eagle View, so they could do whatever they want with the electronic version… the mistake is published. The right thing will be to print a note in the coming edition… own it and get it over with. But if the way they deal with their website is indication of something…
It will be nice of some journalists to think of this: no matter how insignificant a group of people might seem to you, show them a little respect. Be curious, learn about them. Keep yourself updated on what’s going on. If not, then don’t accused them of being dishonest when they test you about what you wrote.
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If you are scratching your head thinking…. come on… La Liga, Nosotros, who cares? We are all one happy family, etc. As a volunteer, I choose were to put my time and effort, and the least I could expect is to be named correctly.. por favor. Or rather, if you don’t know do not mention it. Ignore me, us, it would not be the first time or the last.
Do this to a well known politician or “community leader” and see if the mistake doesn’t get aknowledged.
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Leaving the subject of mistaken identity aside…
.. the Arts Covenant is a very good idea. And I support it all the way!
We just aired an interview with Mary Stanley, coordinator of the initiative, in our radio segment with the program Nosotros.
