Balanced story brings satisfaction
and certainty about a career

By Kara Andrade
Special to chipsquinn.org

Posted: March 16, 2005

Kara Andrade

On Feb. 1, I reported to The Oakland Tribune for the first day of my internship. The sun was barely above the skyline and the reddish glow struck my hand as it lay by the key board. It was Crime Reporter Harry Harris and I and the sound of the city entering through glass windows, the police scanner on full blast to an otherwise empty newsroom.

That was my quietest day. What I remember most about that day was having a different perspective -- a certain surprise at how different the city looked. I already fancied myself part of the eyes and ears of Oakland. In so many ways, I felt adrenaline of change -- of finally pursuing a career I had worked steadily toward the past couple of years. It felt good.

I memorized the layout of the newsroom, who’s who and coverage areas. I learned who the gatekeepers are, which editor I could ask for more inches and which ones were sticklers for the stylebook. I painfully learned how to use an MS-DOS prompt to type my stories into the Xywrite Angnewspapers network.

My first story was a difficult one. It was about a sideshow death, and I was to attend the funeral at 11 a.m., find my sources (I had to use Spanish to interview), coordinate with a photographer and turn my story in by 5 p.m. and cutlines by 6 p.m. I had 25 inches and no more.

More than 1,000 people showed up for the funeral. Friends of the deceased wore R.I.P. shirts with his picture. I found myself moved to tears during the bilingual Mass and asked myself, “Am I supposed to be doing this? Crying?” I remembered my role -- a gadfly on the wall of time, as Socrates put it. I wanted to do justice to this man, to shape words to show the feeling of loss by a pregnant wife who was expecting their child on the day his casket was closed.

This was the second funeral I had attended and written about in a year. This one was easier. It wasn’t about my journalism teacher, who died my first semester of news writing.

Every story I have written since takes up every part of me. As a community organizer and program coordinator, I always have enjoyed meeting people and making things run efficiently. As reporter, I enjoy the same things. I like the constant meeting of people and getting to know their lives. I find pleasure in finding the underbelly of an issue and putting it into perspective -- organizing it in a way that makes complex issues simpler to understand. There’s an important element of the democratic process to always being fair and balanced. When we stop hearing other perspectives of an issue, we close ourselves to change and limit the depth of our thinking and participation in a community.

Last week, I read about a 49-year-old lawyer who shot a 16-year-old boy in self-defense, and I wondered about the specifics of the shooting. A lot of the community seemed to be supporting the lawyer and the printed media covered his point of view but not the boy’s. I wanted to represent the boy’s point of view and balance the perspective. I wanted to focus on the fear and bias that many have toward African-American boys who hang out in groups.

I went to the neighborhood with a photographer and hung out for 3 ½ hours and interviewed young people. I also interviewed the lawyer. I wondered why the community responded so passionately to this man. What did he symbolize for them? What were the issues other than who was to blame?

I felt a responsibility to present a balanced perspective and was grateful that I was able to balance out the story.

The boy’s mother called me the next morning and yelled because she didn’t want the lawyer’s perspective in the story. I listened to her and told her that I appreciated her feedback and that we couldn’t ignore his point of view just like we couldn’t ignore her son’s.

“You have to be sure about your life,” my great-grandmother always said, “and once you’re sure, then you do it and teach others how to do what you do.” At 28, I’m certain that I want to be a journalist. I have realized only recently that the sense of belonging and satisfaction I get every time I work on a story is a happiness that comes from finding what already has found you. I didn’t know it then, but I know it now.

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