No Man's Land and the conflict with media

In the movie, “No Man’s Land” I was struck by a comment made by the journalist, Jane. She said, “Neutrality does not exist in the face of murder. Doing nothing to stop it is, in fact, choosing. It is not being neutral.” I thought this was an interesting comment considering it came from someone who is a third-party member. Jane is a journalist, her job is to report and relay the information to news outlets in England. We don’t know what kind of news source Jane works for, but a good media outlet will report the information in an un-biased way. They simply give accounts of what is happening matter-of-factually. For the sake of the argument, I will assume that is her intent. Jane is experiencing what the majority of the world cannot see. She can see the destruction and the senseless murders of civilians first-hand. But Jane must remain neutral in her reporting. She cannot impose her own beliefs and impressions of the war onto her viewers.            

When I first encountered Jane’s character I had a love/hate relationship with her. I understand that it is her job to report news but I felt that she imposed herself into situations that she should not have been in. For example, she asked the victims which country is at fault for starting the war? To me, that is outright exploitation. Her main motive is to create attention-grabbing stories for her viewers. It is her job to get the hard-hitting stories that will put her company’s news at the top of the ratings. She does this by exploiting the pain and suffering of the victims. By asking who is at fault, she’s creating a biased environment. I think Jen Hudson made a great point when she said that the victims are competing for the narrative that will be remembered. If she would have received an answer about who is at fault for starting the war, that answer will obviously be the narrative that people will remember, whether it is right or wrong. It is a biased narrative that victimizes those in the situation. It characterizes those who belong to the republic that is “at fault” as perpetrators even though every party of the war is suffering just the same.

But as we discussed the media’s role even more, I came to realize how important it was (even though I didn’t agree with the motive). Even though it is Jane’s job to report the news, she used her career as an outlet to spread peace. Without her relentless reporting, the news could have never made it to Dayton, Ohio and the NATO forces. Similarly, a mediator’s job is wildly important. We encourage peace while remaining impartial. And it proves, that it is in fact possible to end conflicts as big as war without the use of force and weapons. Just because we have to facilitate discussion in an un-biased manner, does not mean that we have to remain neutral. We must remain invested in the matter and choose to stop the injustice that is happening by coming up with a resolution.

I can sometimes be hard to be empathetic of conflicts that do not affect us. But all conflicts have stakeholders. A conflict even as small as a disagreement may seem petty to an outsider, but to those affected it is a major issue. Examples like war force us to reflect on the importance of others. We, as mediators, must remain invested in resolving disputes.