Here are three lessons from the frontlines shared by Bicker.
1. Tell the stories of the people
With the war in Ukraine nearing its ninth month, no one has suffered as much as the residents of the country under siege. Bicker focused her coverage on telling their stories. Journalism became a way to amplify the voices of those who had none.
“The whole reason to do this, to go into a war zone, to make sure that we can actually bear witness to these events…is to speak to the people who are actually going through it,” she said.
As many as 200,000 soldiers and 40,000 civilians have been wounded or killed so far. The conflict has also forced over 7 million Ukrainians to flee to neighboring countries – an enormous figure that doesn’t even include those who have left their homes but remain in Ukraine.
“When we go in there, we can find a way to make sure their suffering – what they’re going through, their fear, their angst, the conditions that they’re living in – gets the biggest audience that we can possibly get,” she said.
2. Bear witness and fight disinformation
“This is Anastasia,” Bicker said, as she stood in front of a photo of a beaming child. Three-year-old Anastasia and her father were among the hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians who escaped Mariupol.
“Anastasia’s dad pushed her in a shopping trolley for three days, around fields around Mariupol to get her to safety,” she said. “You can see the state of the car; everything was shot out. The car was completely covered in bullet holes.”
With this flight of refugees, stories like Anastasia’s came flowing out Mariupol in the millions. But as the city continued to fall deeper into the hands of its Russian occupiers, it became more and more difficult for journalists like Bicker to verify information. Disinformation ran rife as fake videos surfaced, and the fog of war settled over casualty counts.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re in a war zone. It doesn’t matter if it’s a report about your local neighborhood lost dog. To keep that trust with your audience,…you have to get your facts right,” she said.
When fact-checking footage, Bicker shared some helpful questions to ask: Who is the source, and are they reliable? Is there anything in the background of the footage that can verify what the source is saying? Is there a time or date stamp? Does the weather and seasonal conditions in the video reflect the date when it was supposedly taken?
“There is a lot of information flying around here in the Philippines. Verify, verify, verify, verify,” she emphasized.
3. Keep an open mind
Even as we stay critical of disinformation, Bicker urged everyone to keep an open mind to stories from all sides.
“Never pre-judge a situation. Never. Keep an open mind. Too many people go in there with preconditions,” she said.
In her case, this mindset proved useful in a very different scenario: her coverage of former US president Donald Trump. Trump has an infamously contentious relationship with the media, as he constantly labeled news stories as “fake news” and made unsupported claims in live press conferences.
“I’ve been called fake news; fake news media. We have been called a number of things. Someone had punched one of my cameramen,” Bicker said.
But as Bicker dove deep into Trump country to speak with his ardent supporters, she found that they welcomed her, not with hostility, but a surprising hospitality.
“People believe what they believe. That’s her belief. She believes, her family believes, the next door neighbor believes, the person across the road believes – he is their fighter,” she explained. “Who am I to tell her differently? It’s so important to be impartial because her voice is just as important as someone down the road.”
Bicker’s lessons come in handy especially for journalists in the Philippines, which continues to reel from one of its most divisive elections ever. Philippine journalists face the stark challenge of preserving truth and impartiality amid a hostile media landscape. – Rappler.com
