Centuries of Silence : the Story of Latin American Journalism / Leonardo Ferreira

Centuries of Silence: The Story of Latin American Journalism Leonardo Ferreira PRAEGER CENTURIES OF SILENCE The Story of Latin American Journalism Leonardo Ferreira Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Ferreira, Leonardo, 1957– Centuries of silence : the story of Latin American journalism / Leonardo Ferreira. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0–275–98397–8 (alk. paper)—ISBN 0–275–98410–9 (pbk : alk. paper) 1. Press—Latin America—History. 2. Journalism—Political aspects—Latin America—History. I. Title. PN4930.F47 2006 079.8–dc22 2006015112 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available Copyright c 2006 by Leonardo Ferreira All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, by any process or technique, without the express written consent of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2006015112 ISBN: 0–275–98397–8 (cloth) 0–275–98410–9 (pbk) First published in 2006 Praeger Publishers, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. www.praeger.com Printed in the United States of America The paper used in this book complies with the Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National Information Standards Organization (Z39.48–1984). 10987654321 To my eternal stars, mi Gaby, Taty, Luisita, Sarita, and Juanita. To my inspiring and beloved mom, the courageous Mary, and to my precious Angie. All determined women, like most others, born to figh for freedom and a sense of harmony in this troubled planet. Contents Preface ix Introduction: When Good News Is Bad News 1 1. Whose Truth on True Street 9 2. A Taste of Freedom 65 3. Taken by War and Censorship 97 4. Modernization and the Press 119 5. How Not to Start a Century 139 6. Hot and Cold Wars, Warm Presses 157 7. Dreaming a Fair World 215 8. One Step Forward, Dozen Backward 233 Notes 259 Bibliography 295 Index 323 Preface Once a boy in a bilingual Presbyterian school in Bogota´ (to avert the bur- dens of Catholic education), the author of this book grew up in a virtual ´ecole des Refus´es, the alleged Colegio Americano, founded in 1869. I had to live in the Great Lakes to understand that “Americano” did not re- ally mean “of the Americas,” as most of us presumed, but of the “United States.” My classmates were Jews (who did not want to go to Hebrew academ- ies), descendants of Arabs (rejected anywhere else), children of middle- class professionals (e.g., small store owners, emerald traders, and broad- casters), Protestant “gringos” (living among adventurous families of preachers), mestizo kids (who were lucky to pay the low tuition avoid- ing rundown public schools), and the occasional offspring of a white and wealthy, though usually immigrant politician or diplomat, willing to mix with these fellows in an exotic environment of no required creed. Later, in North America, I realized with disappointment that Presbyterians were far from the significan openness of their counterparts in the Andes. Dona˜ Luisa Santiaga Marquez´ Iguaran,´ mother of Nobel Literature Award winner Gabriel Garc´ıa Marquez,´ once called my school a “cubil de luteranos” (a lair of Lutherans), forbidding her son to join a branch of such burrow in Barranquilla. “He [my dad] would have preferred [for me to study at] the Colegio Americano,” wrote the prestigious Colombian jour- nalist in his biography Vivir Para Contarla (Living to Tell the Tale), “but my mother discarded [the idea immediately]. Today, in honor of my father, I have to admit that one of my biggest flaw in life as a writer has been not to learn how to speak English,” stated Gabo. x Preface So, like the assassinated presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan,´ I was lucky to study at this school, and I ended up learning English—although thanks to my wife’s coaching more than anything else. I also experienced less parochial ways of life, including the two decades of academia in the United States, tasting the power to freely express my mind, despite nu- merous and frustrating lessons of censorship in both North and South. If my graduation took place in the midst of an unprecedented strike (with dozens of my friends having to leave the school), my university education at the Universidad Nacional (a so-called nest of Marxists) and the Universidad Externado of Colombia (a house of “radical liberals”) went on equally unstable, witnessing repeated closures, the clubbing of fellow students on campus, and the arrival of a long list of Latin American exiles, silenced and displaced by neighboring dictators, corrupt local politicians, imposing church authorities, and intolerant and greedy mass media. In a few years, just by changing schools, I had moved from the epi- thet of Lutheran to that of a radical. Inspired by college professors, honest priests, and fellow students (some of them reporters and activists subse- quently killed in the devastating war against guerrillas and drugtraffick ers), I aired some journalistic reports at the TV Mundo-Channel 7, telling the story of Brazilian, Chilean, and Bolivian families and individuals, torn apart in their own countries. Once enroute toward graduate studies in the United States, a miracle in middle-class circles which rarely enjoy such a benefit I left my loved ones in a country soon to be engulfed in the flame of narcoterrorism. A whole nation, already quiet by human rights abuses, went nearly mute with sheer violence: drugtraffickers paramilitary, and paid murderers (sicar- ios). Narcotized guerrillas also became addicted to violence and drug pro- ceeds, and the oblivious elite and their mass media, previously profitin from illegal drugs, had little if anything to say about their country’s crisis and people’s suffering. Still, courageous reporters (many of them killed in the process to this day) plus a handful of news outlets, ultimately de- stroyed, dismantled, or absorbed by conglomerates (e.g., El Espectador), managed to raise the image of Colombian toughness and ethics in journalism, hoping unsuccessfully to give voice to those crying to speak up. Meanwhile, in the “developed” world, consumers procure narcotics with the same ease as buying a pint of Haagen-Dazs,¨ when millions of Latin Americans are paying a terrible price, often with their own lives. What a painful lesson it is for a decent Latin American to watch for twenty-three years the cynical business, enforcement, and hypocrisy around drugtraffickin in the United States and Europe. My adopted country, convinced that it is second to none in freedom, continues to live in denial of its widespread corruption and self-censorship, unable to effec- tively guarantee full fundamental rights to African-Americans, Hispanics, and other minorities in most communities. The kingdom of silence clearly Preface xi reigns here and there, in Anglo-America as much as in Latin America and the Caribbean. Now that bright U.S. and Latin American critics, including noted com- munication pioneers, have come to denounce their media and societies as a plutocracy of moguls and enchanters, journalism scholars, practition- ers, and audiences may begin using Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann’s spiral of silence to explain why contemporary societies keep talking about freedom and democracy, when war, poverty, crime, censorship, prejudice, and reli- gious or ideological narrow mindedness dominate our news. Indeed, it is essential to ask why people do not openly express deviant opinion? Do they truly believe that ours is a free world that only needs to defeat terrorism to live happily ever after, as if we were in a paradise of liberty? What paradise? Whose paradise? Answers are contextual, that is, more complex in geopolitical, socioeconomic, technological, ideological, and cultural terms of what Neumann originally proposed, but her model is worth using as a starting line for improved analysis. Then, let’s get serious and try to clarify why the vast majority of people are not free to voice their views, their frustrations, and their discontent in a so-called free world. I take this opportunity to deeply thank my long-term mentors Profes- sors Bella Mody of the University of Colorado, Joseph D. Straubhaar of the University of Texas–Austin, and Bradley Greenberg, Barry Litman, Thomas Muth, and the late Marilyn Fife of Michigan State University (the latter also with Temple University) for their teaching and support. I also want to thank my original editor, the retired professor Michael H. Prosser of the Rochester Institute of Technology for his extraordinary encour- agement and advice. To my dear friends and colleagues Miguel Alvaro Sarmiento of the Associated Press Mexico, Rosental C. Alves of Univer- sity of Texas–Austin, William Over of St. John’s University, Rick Rockwell of American University, Federico Subervi of Texas State University–San Marcos, the late Michael Perkins of Brigham Young University, the late Patricia Anzola of Michigan State University, and Mercedes Lynn de Uriarte of the University of Texas–Austin, my sincere appreciation for rec- ommending this volume. I also express my gratitude to the extraordinary Bolivian Dr. Luis Ramiro Beltran´ Salmon,´ a Michigan State University giant, who became my earliest inspiration in the fiel and who kindly stopped in Miami to give me valuable materials, especially his book on our Great Communica- tor, Simon´ Bol´ıvar. My deepest gratitude goes as well to both my Praeger editor Hilary Claggett of the Greenwood Publishing Group, defending and making this project possible, and my copyeditor Vivek Sood, who kindly and pa- tiently tolerated in India repeated additions and delays. I hope to meet and embrace Vivek soon. To my friends Sallie Hughes, Gonzalo Soruco, xii Preface and Michael Salwen of the University of Miami, thanks for their conver- sations, ideas, and feedback. Finally, I also dedicate this book to my best friend and guide.

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