How Does it Get Better?
On the news cycle, my trip to Vietnam, and the Role of the Media
Sometimes, when people find out that I study International Relations, they ask me if I think everything is going to be okay.
I don’t blame them.
Istanbul’s mayor was arrested, Israel violated its ceasefire in Gaza, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine rages on, Ecuador went from the safest to the least safe country in Latin America, and the list goes on, and on, and on.
I wish I had answers but I don’t, and what’s worse is that my professors don’t either. I’ve taken countless classes that have exposed me to the cruelty of humanity in extreme detail, and I’ve analyzed the systems we have in place to hold countries and their leaders accountable for their actions while seeing the world crumble around me.
So when people ask me if I think everything will be okay, I don’t lie, I shrug and tell them that I don’t know. With my peers, we talk about how hard it is to stay positive as we battle reality — how do we acknowledge that the system is broken, that fixing it is incredibly hard, all while remaining positive and determined to do so?
As I was thinking about this, I was reminded of a teacher I had who spent one day a week babysitting his nephews to decompress from his field of research and be reminded that the world, his world at least, has more good than bad.
I think this extends far beyond those of us who study cruelties in detail. Technology and globalization have created a world in which humans, who centuries ago would not know what was happening a hundred metes away from them, can know everything happening everywhere. Unfortunately, the news business and cycles make it so that the “bad news” is the only option, which greatly amplifies this already dramatically skewed perspective.
More often than not, photography is used as a tool to document and transmit these atrocities, to inform yes, but also to further the cycle of violence and bad news, to transport people to the places of nightmares, and accidentally convince them that it’s the only thing worth paying attention to.
When this practice started, it was revolutionary. Freedom of the press became and still is a cornerstone of democratic and safe societies. Photography, amidst many mediums, became a tool for visualizing injustice and advocating for democracy, and to this day, its power holds. It has kept us connected with Gaza, and in tune with Lebanon and Syria.
At the same time, in an era of constant information, it is also important to let media be a beacon of hope. Coverage of terrible events tries to ensure that those who commit them are held accountable, and that the world can rally behind victims, but coverage of hopeful and joyful events guarantees that when the time comes to stand up for those who need it, the public is not desensitized and burnt out.
Amidst documenting the bad, we forgot to continue documenting the good, therefore we are losing sight of what we’re fighting for, accidentally normalizing violence, and creating a population that is no longer appalled by the fall of a democracy or the invasion and torture of a population, but rather believes it’s a natural occurrence in the news cycle.
Take Vietnam for example. In high school I studied Ron Haeberlee’s photographs on the Mai Lai Massacre, in university I studied reconciliation efforts, and generational effects through documentaries, and recently, at a Banksy exhibit, I saw his remixed version of Nick Ut’s famous Vietnam photograph of Phan Thi Kim Phuc, the naked girl running from explosions in Trảng Bàng.
The proliferation of this kind of media is important, in many ways it shaped how the public, especially the US, thought of the war, but I believe the reason it was so impactful was because people were seldom exposed to horrors like that, making the images they were seeing enough of a fire starter to spark action.
I visited Vietnam last December, almost 50 years after the war ended. Remnants of the war’s impacts are everywhere, entire towns destroyed and communities decimated, people still battling the generational effects of trauma and chemical warfare, but there is also joy, beauty, and astounding nature.
Seeing Vietnam from this angle, made me understand at a deeper level what was there before the war. In my brain, the Vietnam I saw and photographed was suddenly overlaid over the one I learned about. With that image sharpened in my mind, the war’s destruction felt even more staggering.
So I think the problem is twofold. On one hand, In today’s media cycle, we see so much hurt, so much pain, that we feel overwhelmed with approaching it, but also by just seeing pain, we forget the humanity and the lives that are hidden behind atrocities. Documenting the positive aspects, whether in a specific conflict or more broadly, and actively acknowledging them, helps dissolve a portion of desensitization and overwhelm, instead replacing it with duty, ambition, and perhaps most crucially, hope.
S