If you didn’t know it, you do now: Good or bad, the world is watching Kauai. The Media Consortium recently announced its participation in the “Kauai Media and Journalism Project — The World is Watching.” The Kauai Project, according to
If you didn’t know it, you do now: Good or bad, the world is watching Kauai.
The Media Consortium recently announced its participation in the “Kauai Media and Journalism Project — The World is Watching.”
The Kauai Project, according to a press release, is “designed to look at Kauai as a microcosm of biotech agriculture and its impacts both on local communities and on the world’s food supply.”
Here’s what is going to happen:
Over the next two years, up to 10 Media Consortium member news organizations will send reporters to Kauai. Reporters will collaborate, sharing sources and story ideas. Outlets will publish jointly across different media platforms. All will cross-promote each other’s content using a joint website. Outlets taking part in the first phase of this project include Earth Island Journal, Truthout, Specialty Studios, KCET/LINKTV and Yes! Magazine.
Of course, this leads to the question, “Why Kauai?”
And the answer, not exactly a short one, is:
“Kauai is the subject of this project because it is not only a microcosm of the issues surrounding biotech agriculture such as pesticide-based pollution and GMO food, but also a microcosm of other important issues facing communities all over the world.
Money in politics, overbearing corporate influence, corruption, new solutions for sustainable local economies, indigenous rights, rights of nature, and state and federal influence and preemption over local governments to protect the health and welfare of their people, are all strongly present on Kauai and make for a rich set of stories that need to be investigated, reported on and shared with the world.
This is the goal of the project – to have the members of The Media Consortium collaborate with each other and leverage their resources to dig in, get to the truth of the matter and reveal the deeper interconnectedness of these issues so the world understands better what is happening in Kauai and in their communities.”
Now, this isn’t really anything groundbreaking. News organizations have long been sending reporters to Kauai, and we’re pretty sure each of them will tell you they’re here to get the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth. Not many will proclaim they’re here to make up a bunch of stuff.
And naturally, they all believe they can stop by, interview some folks, take some pictures, attend some meetings, and viola, the rest of the world will nod in wonder at Kauai. “Ah, so that’s what’s it all about!” They believe they’ll discover Kauai’s “deeper interconnectedness” in this two-year project just so they can make the world understand this island. Good for them.
We agree there are terrific stories to be told about Kauai, ones that the world could very well learn from, though perhaps not the ones the consortium is after.
By their own words, they’re after stories about “money in politics, overbearing corporate influence, corruption…”
The people that live here can tell them what makes Kauai tick.
This is a place of heart and passion, an island of strength and courage, filled with communities of dedicated, caring people who love their families and friends and work hard. Perhaps this news group will take their stories to the rest of world, so it can get the real story of Kauai.
The world is watching? Bring it on.
