All the news we choose
If I stand at my north-facing window and look out at the street, I see a particular slice of the city: the building across the street, the cars parked in front of the window, the passers-by who drift across my field of vision. If I move to another window in this same apartment, the view is different, even though the distance betwen the two windows is not very great. If I go to the cafe only a block away, and sit at a table by the cafe's window, I can't see my building, nor can I see the cars parked in front it. If I am at the Cathedral, a mere six miles away, I see a completely different slice of the city, and the Bronx might just as well not exist.
When I was in Europe, the news I read and heard rose from a European perspective. In France, the news focuses on what is happening in France. The United States is seen from a distance, and believe me, It looks different. Seems obvious, yes? There are things going on in the States that I would not find out about from French or Belgian or British news sources, just as there are things happening elsewhere that I can't access from my various "windows" here. In fact, If there is a wildfire raging in Southern California, I have to turn to the Los Angeles Times to learn exactly where it is burning, because the media here on the east coast tend to say "wildfires in California hills". California is an immense slice of land, and "which hills?" is an urgently important question to me, because I have friends living in that state, in fire-prone canyons and hills.
As I write, as many as two million protesters fill Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt. The people intend to change their government. They are exercising one of the great privileges of democracy, and, so far, this demonstration is peaceful. I am watching a live stream on Al-Jazeera English. Egyptian state television is showing a very different picture - small pro-Mubarek demonstrations, largely empty streets -from what Al-Jazeera is showing. I know this because I can access Al-Jazeera's website. I am grateful for the Internet. It may or may not not take the place of newspapers in my hand, but it excells in breaking news that used to have to wait for the "extra" edition to hit the streets. I'm also grateful to be living in a place where the internet is neither government- nor single corporation-run, at least thus far.
But if I lived in Canada, I apparently could be watching Al-Jazeera's coverage of this event on TV. Here in the States, most of us can't, as the cable companies do not offer it. This denial of access has the appearance of corporate censorship. Huffington Post opines that the companies are afraid of losing subscribers, and that it's a money-based decision, not an idealogical one. It's a moot point, though, because the result is the same either way.
When I was a little girl, there was a lot of talk about the "domino theory". If communism took hold in one country, my teacher said, it would spread like a cold virus to every neighboring nation. At the time, I thought that might be true because grownups were saying it. But their dominoes could only fall one way, and that didn't make sense, because I had a box of dominoes and knew thay have two sides, and because I already learned in school something it seemed the grownups had forgotten. We already had the best virus-stopper ever: democracy. All we had to do, I reasoned, was to really be what we said we were: the Land of the Free. The one shining place where people could be free to live, work, dream, worship, create, be informed, and vote as they choose. If we really were that, the example would be irresistible, and everyone would want to live in a democracy like we did. The dominoes would fall the other way. It was so simple.
These days, I would use the phrase "walk it like we talk it", and heaven help me, I still think it could be that simple.
At this writing, we are criticising the current (and probably outgoing) Egyptian government for attempting to shut down communication by instituting a fear-driven blockage of news media and the internet. At this same writing, most American cable stations do not allow access to Al-Jazeera's news coverage for what may be the fear of losing subscribers and revenue.
Listening deeply, talking freely, exercising courtesy, reading widely and having many choices (which is only possible when one is informed that such choices exist), and the freedom to make them - these were what I thought important as a child. Haven't much changed my mind.
In Henry James' novel, The Portrait of a Lady, the lead character Isabel says, "I always want to know the things one shouldn't do."
"So as to do them?" asked her aunt.
"So as to choose." said Isabel.