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Politicians
are completely full of it, especially during interviews with
journalists, and especially during an election year. So what happens
when a news team consisting of only developmentally disabled adults
tries to get past the vote-mongering spin and to the truth? A new movie
shares their eye-opening, hilarious, and revealing journey to the center
of American bullshit.
How's Your News? is a project
that initially started 15 years ago, at a summer camp for
developmentally disabled adults. According to the project's website, a
video class at the camp wanted to include as many participants as
possible in a project, and so they made a news program where campers
reported on news stories and eventually did man-on-the-street interviews
in a nearby town. They've done tons of projects since, from a series on
MTV to an episode of This American Life. Their newest film is called Election 2012,
and features footage of the three-person news team reporting from the
Democratic and Republican National Conventions and on the campaign
trail.
This
project is cool for a few reasons. First, it showcases the humor,
drive, and humanity of adults with developmental disabilities (contrary
to what Sarah Palin might say, people with disabilities are not magical
angels sent down from heaven to teach us lessons; they're people
with strengths and weaknesses and ideas, like you or me). Second, the
way their subjects react to them is incredibly revealing and interesting
of their character. Like the part in the preview when Ann Coulter is
being gracious and kind and honest and not condescending to Jeremy? SO
EMOTIONALLY CONFUSING FOR ME.
How's Your News describes the
project as a "positive, empowering view of life with a disability."
Check out the preview for free, or watch the whole thing at the
project's website.
Beth Haller, Ph.D., is Co-Director of the Global Alliance for Disability in Media and Entertainment (www.gadim.org). A former print journalist, she is a member of the Advisory Board for the National Center on Disability and Journalism (https://ncdj.org/). Haller is Professor Emerita in the Department of Mass Communication at Towson University in Maryland, USA. Haller is co-editor of the 2020 "Routledge Companion to Disability and Media" (with Gerard Goggin of University of Sydney & Katie Ellis of Curtin University, Australia). She is author of "Representing Disability in an Ableist World: Essays on Mass Media" (Advocado Press, 2010) and the author/editor of Byline of Hope: Collected Newspaper and Magazine Writing of Helen Keller (Advocado Press, 2015). She has been researching disability representation in mass media for 30+ years. She is adjunct faculty in the Disability Studies programs at the City University of New York (CUNY) and the University of Texas-Arlington.