Support for Indymedia reporters

We have got to start acknowledging indy reporters as professionals. To only pay middle class male organizers and attorneys in activism is not good. I am an indy media reporter. I am low income. I would like very much to cover the trials in Eugene of the environmental activists. But I simply cannot afford it, which leaves me sad...

Activists are not complaining about paying attorney fees for activists accused of crimes.

And AP reporters are on paid work time when reporting on activists.

Organizers require pay, such as Chuck0 at infoshop.org, yet when I ask for pay as a lowly poor woman writer, I am hit with an onslaught of "capitalist pig" statements. While I am called a capitalist pig for asking for very small amounts of money to continue reporting and writing on community issues, people like Chuck0 are given thousands a month for his private vacations. People like Tim the editor of Real Change News, a "poverty action" paper, in Seattle also is paid $50,000 a year to himself as a salary but wants me to write for free for him...The inequity is grand.

I am not sure what to do here. I simply do not have the funds to travel to and from Eugene repeatedly to cover these trials. I do not have money for lodging like many of the families do as well. I also am losing great amounts of time on this eco-defense reporting. I spend hours doing research, making costly long distance calls, hours writing and syndicating the things I found. I spend hours helping people involved understand the legal process and charges...and all for free. When I was already struggling for food money.

I have to make a choice of survival. And it kills me.

I can either just not cover these eco-defense trials, and watch as the AP report on them with slurs and falsehoods...and watch indy media miss info I could get...

Or I can not eat to cover stories of people who came from the middle class, and who do have family with money and supporters willingly paying other support efforts.

Basically, if I continue to work on these cases, I will not eat. Tough choice.

I guess I do not understand why indy media does not want to legitimize its own reporters with support. I simply cannot compete with AP reporters. I am not paid. I also do not even get the pay that most men in activism I know get. I am not of the social economic class where I can just subsidize alt media like this. It is a serious issue for me.

I want to cover these hearings in Eugene. I believe with my legal training and past as a minutes recorder for the government, the City of Eugene no less, and my ties to environmental activism that I would be one of the most qualified indy media reporters to cover these trials. I believe my accounts from the hearings would be more thorough and coherent than almost any other indy media reporter could produce in these circumstances. Yet, I am gonna have to let someone less qualified do the job as I am in the wrong social caste. The same thing happened at the RNC protests. If I had gotten support to go as a reporter, instead of infoshop sending chuck0 who returned with nothing, I would have produced massive articles for the community. But I could not afford to go. So we got very few thorough journalist pieces from alt media afterwards honestly. It breaks my heart to miss those opps due to money.

Are there any people out there who are interested in SUPPORTING an indy media reporter pool with actual MONEY? Cuz we are not getting anywhere without it. And the white middle class men in alt media grab all the money first...so it needs to actually be earmarked for nonwhite nonmales...I cannot fund this indy media thing, that is for sure. I would love to report on these issues, I would love to do more research on these issues, but I also need to eat.

It is a really tough choice for me. Make sure my friend has a professional level reporter from indy media present during the trial and not eat to pay for that, while I also know the accused has a middle class family paying for all kinds of other support, or just do the work I can get that pays rent and food, and let those with money and means handle the whole environmental trials fiasco we are facing. It is really a hard choice for me.

I HATE leaving that reporting to others.

But this is how class plays out, even in indy media.

I feel that part of the support money for these trials must go to indy journalists if we want someone other than AP reporters going on record. But I know that, as Jed Brandt of NYC IMC says, "writers will be paid last." I still need to eat. So...what now?

I am so sad that money, once again, has separated me from my ability to do activism. I wish to god we valued reporters the way we do attorneys. I am sad at this realization that I cannot afford to subsidize this reporting and have to stop...makes me very very sad.

If anyone out there with money ever wants to fund an indy media reporter pool, I will be behind you 100%. We are never going to be taken seriously if we treat our reporters as needy bums. I personally am sick of begging for support. The activist community supports many many white middle class men from Jed Brandt to Chuck0 to geov parrish to stan goff to Jason Mcguinn. When will they start supporting women writers? Almost every anarchy mag out there is 95% male written. I just do not know what to do with this. I have given endlessly yet still am supposed to pay for all my own work while poorer than most and while those with higher class levels get paid for their prisoner support work.

I cannot afford to be an indy media reporter and it breaks my f*ckin heart.

If someone would like to help me be able to cover these trials with monetary support, you can send Money orders or cash to Kirsten Anderberg, POBox 9038, Seattle, Wa 98109. Or you can email me at kirstena [at] resist.ca...but at this point in time, if someone does not step up with some monetary support, I simply will not be able to cover these hearings. Period. It breaks my heart, but the reality is I am not middle class and I have no way to pay for what is required to report on these cases. And arrogant as it sounds, I actually do believe no one in indy media could do a better job reporting on these trials than I could. And it breaks my heart to have to choose survival over helping others with my reporting.

I am willing to just go do what other work is in front of me that I can afford to persue...but it kills me to have to not report on this due solely to social caste. These are the things poor people deal with that the middle class never even know exist. Chuck0 from Infoshop never had to choose between housing or activism, he still has free rent in a suburban house...in his 40's. The last time I was allowed home wihtout rent was in 1976. So we are not even competing with the same resources and it feels lik eI am defeated before I even began due to money money money. I look at AKPRess' webiste and see ALL male authors on their front page. It is discouraging to even keep trying. And I did give a hell of a lot away for free to be simply labelled a capitalist pig for asking for so little back.

My point is: If you want media that competes legitimately with the AP, you are going to need to treat indy reporters with actual professional support. At this point, we have NO support that I can acertain. We are on our own, which leaves indy reporting predominantly to the middle class men who can afford it ( and who make sure THEY are paid first). Which means indy reporting is not very different than mainstream reporting. I want to help interject a new class and gender voice to alt media in comparison to the past predominantly middle class male voices, yet it seems impossible. I certainly cannot afford it. Places like AKPress, Infoshop.org, Anarchy mag, alt press review, the A word, and others act like men are the only people on earth. I want to be a reporter on the alt media circuit, but why bother when the men control alt media the same as the main media? AKPress lets me know from their front page NO WOMEN WANTED. Alt Press Review, the A Word, Anarchy Mag, al let me know - WOMEN WRITERS NOT WANTED. I just want to know where women, poor women, in alt press, get some respect and support equal to the men? And if I quit due to these inequities, it just stays the same. Men dominate. It is a dilemma I am not sure how to fix.

Looking at Stan Goff's website, he says he will not be present for a speaking engagement for less than $500 and $1000 if you are a school. If I charged those prices, well, it would be laughable. When I look at my peers and how much they are paid for comprable work, it is very very discouraging as I grovel for food money.

Oh well. Just wanted to let you know that if you see no other reporters on scene at trials, but AP, it is because indy media does not have support for reporters together. The indy reporters who will show to those trials will be ones who could afford it. I couldn't and if I do go, I will be spending rent and food money. SOmething I really need to consider.

I wish activists supported poor women writers as freely with money as they do chuck0 Jed Brandt Joe Bageant Stan Goff and others, all white middle class men who are being paid daily by activists.