media literacy
The importance of debate
on MEDIA | by Logan Nakyanzi Pollard | February 13, 2025
“My eyes were opened by a classmate in college who explained to me rather tersely that international aid was not a simple thing, in fact it was complicated, and often a means to indenture nations.”
I thought he was being rude.
Really rude.
But his rudeness made me curious.
Why was he so exasperated?
Why was he so angry?
And then, I realized: oh man, oh man.
I had been prideful assuming I knew everything about Africa. But I was just a freshman, and only knew what my parents had sheltered us from.
So this is a a poem about
the obvious.
Because not everyone is with the class.
Like my colleagues who think that a few budget analyses are reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
When we finally went back to Africa, I remember the abrupt change. It was like, we need to be real with you, kids: like our parents quietly telling us how to handle ourselves if we came across a teenager with a machine gun.
I remember looking at my younger brother one day on one of these “vacations,” and both of us being like, this was one of the most *@#$! exhausting trips of our lives. Why can’t we be like a normal family?!
And yet, as I washed from a basin in the darkness, the heated water warm like a blanket and the night sky jet black blue the starlight barely visible and across what seemed like a valley, and drums beating (maybe it was a wedding), I realized: this was the most beautiful place in the world to me.
Nothing felt real the way it felt in Africa.
And I loved my grandfather’s house.
I hid my admiration because it was easier to complain than to say this.
It was funner.
My grandmother could kill a chicken with her bare hands. They’d wander around the yard, and then we’d be like:
There goes “Thursday…”
Because Thursday was dinner.
You really appreciate meat sometimes.
I never liked foreigners telling locals what to do for these reasons.
Especially the bleeding hearts.
So grating:
Go ?><@#$% yourselves.
Let me say this in a more Christian way because Jesus wants me to talk better:
Does it make you feel superior to help someone “lesser”?
Do you give to receive? What is the cost?
I think there’s a lot of that in this conversation.
And other things . . .
We joked about whether we were going to get out of there.
Even though the experience was important and we knew we would leave.
But it would never leave us.
I share all of this to say: what you think is so terrible is not at all.
Not at all.
For example:
I worked for the media (as you know).
I’ve seen what they do, and what they did.
I was part of a machine.
What we did not report and would not report.
The beautiful thing that is happening now though is the public is awake.
They know. They know. They know!
How lovely is a free person!
Back to my colleagues, the asleep ones:
As you seek to tell the public what to think – (and they’re not listening) you’ve lost the fine and beautiful art of debate.
And this, my friends:
is one of the best things in life.
A dinner party.
Who wants only the same side?
We want and need real conversation.
How boring to be in this echo chamber
of dummies.
Put another way. As a child of someone who survived a dictator, you assimilate by trauma-osmosis the ability to recognize stupidity … danger, and … real danger.
None of these are the same things.
None of these are happening.
Well, maybe they are (which is why I’m probably writing this):
But the perils are not of the type you think:
Could it be that YOU are the real danger?
Gasp!
Not that colored lady again! How dare anyone critique the corrupt and newly joblesse oblige who siphoned millions off to mostly (acknowledging that not all were, obviously) and evidently dubious programs overseas!
Wake up.
Jesus said to Lazarus.
(God will help you with discernment.)
But maybe you’re not interested in Him anymore.
Go on. Figure it out yourself.
See how that goes.
I do not oppose wanderings.
I was like that many times, for many years.
My point in saying all this is not to oppose opposition.
I don’t care what anyone thinks: by that I mean, you have a right to whatever opinion you have.
I love, love as they say.
Contrasting viewpoints are good.
My point is to say: treasure the debate.
Appreciate the other side.
If you care for democracy.
If you have ill will, you want only to think about what you see, what you know.
Who does that?
Well a lot of scary people do.
But in between, you will find the truth.
If you’re a journalist: remember there are always multiple sides to a story.
Are you only telling one?
Two?
Seek –
And find.
Examine why 80% of the country is not with you.
Stats fluctuate, but the majority of Americans have deep questions about overseas aid, examples from recent reports from the AP and other legacy media:
Are they really all fools?
Have you never been wrong?
Have you always been right?
I’ve been wrong dozens of times, and each time I realized this, it revealed something beautiful, something important that I needed to know.
I treasure these missteps, which were actually paths
to knowing.
… Lazarus, come forth.
(John 11:43)
This poem isn’t about trying to make you feel better, but about pointing to some truths about foreign aid overseas. If you can deal with that, and have been displaced, moved or otherwise disrupted by a layoff and want to discuss new career paths, click the button below. Equally, if you are a journalist (or ex-journalist) it is of critical importance to support diversity of thought at a time where groupthink is pervasive. It’s literally your job to not be one-sided, as much as your bosses might be telling you to be. If you need help in brainstorming what your leadership could look like around this topic, do click the button below as well.
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