The Real Story

Right now, the Middle East is slipping into chaos: Hamas attacked Isreal and now Isreal is bombing Gaza and will, presumably, invade that region in the near future. Here in the U.S., there are pro-Palestine protests about the bombings in Gaza. Countering that, there are pro-Isreal factions calling the Arabs terrorists for attacking Isreal. Every news story seems to be slanted one way or the other, it’s difficult to trust the mainstream news because who knows what is going on behind the scenes at CNN or Fox or Al Jazeera or other news sources: What is their agenda? Where does their money come from? Can I trust the news, any news?

I’ve been watching these videos by a U.S. citizen named Peter Santenello. Basically, he goes into an area like Compton or Ukraine or Iran or Chicago and spends a few days exploring and talking to people, just him, a Go Pro, and a couple of small, fuzzy mics. As far as I can tell he does not have an agenda beyond learning about places, what the people are like, what their day to day life and culture are like. It is very raw, very unproduced…and it seems this is the future of real journalism. Peter has sponsors and maybe they are or will exert influence, but it certainly doesn’t feel like it watching his past and current videos.

The situation in Palestine is difficult. I know very little but it seems Isreal has mistreated the Arabs. Again, I am still learning and this is simply my take. It seems the regional Arabs are frustrated because western countries always side with Isreal, don’t condemn them when they take land and part of that is because Christians herald the return of the Jews to the region. So…Hamas decided to lash out, killing scores of Isrealis and kidnapping others. This will only make the situation worse for Palestinians as we can see with the bombings in Gaza; Hamas had to have know Isreal’s response would be brutal—why did they do it? It is a huge, fucking mess, no elegant way to put it.

Peter shot videos in Iran four years ago and more people need to watch them. It does not show Iranians as “turban wearing fanatics,” it shows them as human beings working in shoe stores or skateboarding or obsessing over Instagram. You know, normal people. I remember Anthony Bourdain did one of his “food documentaries” in Iran several years ago and, once again, we see Iranians as just…people, not unlike folks in the United States or Korea or Finland. And we lose sight of that because the real story on the ground has to go through so many filters and edits before it reaches our phones or laptops or televisions. It is more of a challenge getting the real story nowadays, but it’s out there...