Re: Sanjay Gupta
Posted by hi G on 2011. 4. 28. 10:49Went to a speech by Dr. Sanjay Gupta, the CNN medical correspondent who visited Brown today. Right now, classmates are raving about his lecture on Facebook. His talk, however, didn’t inspire me the same way Paul Farmer's did several years ago. I do not mean to undermine Dr. Gupta's success or good intentions, but I feel that his reporting benefits himself more than the people he reports about. The surgeries that he performed in Iraq and Haiti do not tell a story of justice or equality of access that he emphasized earlier in his speech; it’s a show, rather, whose ultimate purpose is to please the Western viewers who vicariously feel good about themselves.
Paul Farmer certainly gets a lot of celebrity, too, but I feel that he uses this resource directly to advance his cause, to increase access to healthcare for the poor. His work has a more defined purpose. But I am confused as to what the point of Dr. Gupta's lecture was: To be a baller like him?
Something bothers me because I am also interested in writing and journalism, and I don’t know how I can do it without committing the same mistake that the media industry has long been accused of: voyeurism, pornography of pain, and self-absorbed, ethnocentric reporting. This is not an accusation aimed at Dr. Gupta, who, as a doctor, has saved many lives, but a quick reflection on the role of the media and aspiring journalists.
Paul Farmer certainly gets a lot of celebrity, too, but I feel that he uses this resource directly to advance his cause, to increase access to healthcare for the poor. His work has a more defined purpose. But I am confused as to what the point of Dr. Gupta's lecture was: To be a baller like him?
Something bothers me because I am also interested in writing and journalism, and I don’t know how I can do it without committing the same mistake that the media industry has long been accused of: voyeurism, pornography of pain, and self-absorbed, ethnocentric reporting. This is not an accusation aimed at Dr. Gupta, who, as a doctor, has saved many lives, but a quick reflection on the role of the media and aspiring journalists.