The Project for excellence in Journalism reported this month that for the first time in years Afghanistan has "emerged as the top story" for news organizations in the United States.
Richard Engel of NBC said that “It’s like the Baghdad class of 2003 is now the Kabul class of 2009,".
The recent expansion of coverage and the "deployment" of more journalists to the area may be due to President Obama's new strategies for Afghanistan and Pakistan. Another reason is because news companies are starting to take a closer look at the war in these regions because it is sometimes referenced as the "forgotten war".
Safety is of course an issue for all of the media that is going to be reporting out of these dangerous regions, and news organizations have increased the precautions for their staff.
It took reading this article for me to realize that I haven't really heard much about the war in Afghanistan in a long time. I do believe that more light should be shed on the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but that the staff of these news organizations should be very careful.
Yeah I think they need to be really careful out there in Afghanistan. True we need to be informed of what's going on but I've seen journalists report in the middle of battles/gun fights. I still respect those that do risk their lives to deliver the reality of the situation, because just like the reporters who worked in Vietnam they are only giving us what we want.
ReplyDeleteSadly, the war in Afghanistan has been greatly forgotten. Isn't that region the reason we went to war in the first place? What did Iraq have to do with anything?
ReplyDeleteSoldiers are dying every day in bitter firefights in Afghanistan but it isn't nearly as controversial of a war or subject as us being in Iraq, so most people don't even think about it. I think Iraq is winding down though for the most part, so the media is just going to go where the action is.
I understand that we have to get the news on what is going on over seas, but it puts jornalists in a very dangerous position. They should come up with a different technique to get the news of what is going on over there.
ReplyDeleteWe did the same article! I really feel strongly about this because I do not understand how we are involved in a war that most citizens don't know a thing about. When 911 happened this country was so fired up and ready to go to war, and after lives are lost, money is spend, in the end no one even knows why, or what is going on over there. This country has a serious problem with war, and are extremely uninformed.
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