There is a cliche in the journalism world that “if it bleeds, it leads.” While it is certainly true that bad news is the focus of a great deal of journalism, it is by no means true that pain and suffering are sufficient to draw attention to a particular news story. Reading about suffering, unless we somehow feel that those suffering somehow deserve it, tends to lead us to feel some sort of sympathy and compassion with those suffering. And when there are people suffering who those who are responsible for providing the news do not want us to feel sympathy for, or when those who are inflicting the suffering are not those who decide what news is fit to print or to show want us to feel anger towards, such suffering often ends up forgotten and obscure. Nor need there be anything so malicious as this, as sometimes suffering happens when there is no one around who can chronicle it in a way that will draw the attention of others who are not specifically looking for it. For a variety of reasons, some stories simply get buried, and are never told, or at least are not told to those who would be inclined to pay attention to the story and perhaps even to act on it.

One of the chief benefits of having a degree of diversity in perspectives is that it increases the likelihood that there will be at least someone who can chronicle something that feels a story is worth covering. There may be some stories that are buried because they are uncomfortable to some people, but which other people may address because there is some worth in doing so. Freedom of the press is worthwhile not to make journalists a protected class as journalists, but to provide for the sort of diverse publishing that allows everything at least to be potentially brought to light so that others at least have the chance to hear about and consider it. In the 19th century, for example, the press was extremely partisan, but it was at least diversely so, so that if one was dissatisfied with the point of view of Democratic operatives, one could at least read a paper from the Whigs or later the Republicans and see what was being deliberately ignored or suppressed. The same would be true in reverse as well. One of the dangers of the contemporary world–and any sort of society where the government plays too big a role in legitimizing the press and censoring its activities–is that one no longer gets enough diversity in what is covered, allowing some things to go on that are widely known but not talked about because it is too dangerous to do so, and still other things to go on that are not widely known because no one is willing or able to talk about them.

As an independent writer, I have a great deal of freedom in choosing what I write about. So long as I have the time, the interest, and a working internet connection, I can write about whatever I feel like. I do not expect to make any money from what I am writing and fully accept whatever personal responsibility is involved in the material that is written about, should there be any repercussions for it, since there is no one to pass the buck to. In general, I have had a less enjoyable time writing when editors are involved, as there is often a lot of pointless rewrites and edits because the editor has something particular in mind that he (or she) want to be said and is not good enough at writing to do it themselves. I have been told by at least a couple of editors that it is difficult to edit my own writings, in large part because my writing is so closely attached to my personal voice, and that suggests that the frustration is mutual between writers and editors with regards to messages getting across and whether the voice of an author is viewed as being acceptable in a given press. Every magazine or newspaper has its own voice, and sometimes that voice does not always harmonize with the voice of the authors that could write for them.

I am also aware, in thinking about such matters, that possibly such things are of interest to me because I am a writer. The problems that exist for writers of all kinds are at least potentially of interest to me because I strongly identify as a writer and have written in many different genres over the course of my life as a writer, which began in childhood. The trouble that writers have in being properly compensated and recognized for their work is trouble that is of interest to me because to some extent it is part of the trouble of my own existence. Yet such trouble is not necessarily of interest to other people. Songs about the experience of songwriting, like Chicago’s “25 or 6 to 4” or Maren Morris’ “Circles Around This Town” are more interesting to me than they otherwise would be to someone who does not share the experience of late-night insomnia writing or the frustration of trying to see one’s writing bear any fruit. Books about writing are books that I could sometimes write and generally enjoy reading from the point of view of a fellow practitioner in writing. But to the extent that we are interested in reading about as reasonable an approximation as we can come to the truth, we should all want the barriers to writing to be as low as possible so that as many stories get told as possible, so that they can be read and carefully thought about. The proliferation of silence is something that we should all view with considerable concern, because that silence hides a lot that needs to be seen and judged in the harsh light of day.