An Outsider in the Inner Circle

One of the greatest thrills for a journalist is the feeling of being in the inner circle, of knowing things that no one else does—at least not yet. Even if you don’t make it to the top of a newspaper like the Spectator, all reporters work to develop contacts who can tell you secrets. And what could be more exciting than knowing an important secret? Slowly, you start to feel like you are part of the same elite group as the people you cover. Until you learn better.

This is true at all levels of journalism, from the Columbia College Student Council beat writer all the way up to the White House Press Corps—everyone wants to be a player in “insider baseball.” But this in-crowd feeling is especially alluring to young student journalists who want not only to write for the New York Times someday but also to feel connected to and accepted by the charismatic and influential individuals known as “student leaders.” And late-night phone calls about breaking stories and probing one-on-one interviews can create the illusion of intimacy between source and reporter.

But then there comes a moment—often in the aftermath of an unflattering story—when suddenly the leader of the CCSC (or Muslim Students Association, or College Democrats) is no longer your friend. What is so difficult about this moment is not the temporary tension caused by whatever it is you have written—this blows over. But with this moment comes the painful realization that you are not, in fact, part of the inner circle. You are separated from the people and events you write about by your role as a reporter, a lesson which can be difficult to learn.

My moment came towards the end of my sophomore year in the midst of my coverage of a campus controversy that many students may not remember (either because they were still in high school or because it has since been overshadowed by the likes of Jim Gilchrist and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad). In Apr. 2006, a student coalition known as Stop Hate on Columbia’s Campus staged a series of demonstrations on Low Plaza. SHOCC formed in response to a series of campus hate crimes, particularly the defacement of a Ruggles suite by two Columbia students with racist and homophobic messages.

The Ruggles incident took place in Dec. 2005, and SHOCC was formed soon after to push for changes such as diversity training and revisions to the Core Curriculum (sound familiar?). By March, the students were fed up with administrative negotiations and wanted to take their cause public. To plan demonstrations, they held a series of open meetings to incorporate as many ideas as possible—open to all students, but not to me. Because organizers wanted everyone to be able to speak freely, reporters were barred from parts of the meetings.

This was certainly their right, and the exclusion might not have stung so much if it hadn’t been so public. In the middle of a tightly packed meeting one night in Earl Hall, an organizer stood up and announced that the rest of the meeting would be closed to administrators and reporters, so would they please leave? It may be a revisionist trick of memory, but I could swear she was looking directly at me when she said this. And so, cheeks burning, I squeezed out of the desk into which I was wedged and made my way through the seated crowd to the door.

Up until that moment, I had been conscious of my role as a reporter, but I thought I had unique access to SHOCC’s leaders, and I had even imagined myself as some sort of megaphone for their cause. But that experience made me realize the truth: that I wasn’t one of them and that I could never be. And if I wanted to be a fair and objective reporter, I couldn’t even be their megaphone. It was also clear to me then, as it is now, that in choosing to be a reporter, I had given up the opportunity to simply be a student—one who would have been welcome at that meeting.

At least, I have always seen it that way. But not everyone agrees with the Great Wall of China between journalism and activism. Some argue for “community journalism,” the idea that campus (and other local) publications should stop worrying about objectivity and actively focus coverage on certain groups or problems. But since the Spectator is meant to be Columbia’s undergraduate student paper, it seems unfair to advocate for certain groups within that population at the expense of others. Certainly a person could always switch from journalism to activism mid-way through college, but somehow I couldn’t. Even after having given up my position at the Spectator to study abroad last year, I still find myself looking at Columbia through the lens of a reporter, unwilling to take sides even in my thoughts.

Sometimes I wonder what the last four years of my life would have been like if I had instead joined the student groups and the protests that I covered. But I made the choice to write about them instead, and given the chance to do it all over again, I don’t think I would do anything differently.

The author is a Columbia College senior majoring in political science. She was a campus news deputy on the 129th and 130th Deputy Boards.