Speaker 1: Hudson River Radio dot com. It beats listening to nothing.
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, it's Frank being Frank. Fright. We're the
Speaker 2: only way to be is Frank. Hello everyone, and welcome
Speaker 2: to being Frank. We're the only way to be, is Frank.
Speaker 2: I'm your host, Franklebono, and i'd like to thank you
Speaker 2: for joining us on what we like to call the
Speaker 2: Intelligent Conversation podcast, where no conversation is out of bounds,
Speaker 2: in all points of view are welcome. You know, we
Speaker 2: record live to tape, and I always give you dates
Speaker 2: so you have some context and relevance. It is the
Speaker 2: twenty first of March and we are still celebrating women's
Speaker 2: history months, so I'm glad you've joined us. I wonder
Speaker 2: how many of my listeners are familiar with the names
Speaker 2: Martha Gellhorn, Lee Miller, and Marie Colvin. I'm sure that
Speaker 2: some of you may have at least heard the names before,
Speaker 2: but I'm willing to wager that the great majority have not,
Speaker 2: or their incredible achievements, and that's a shame, because those
Speaker 2: three women were among the greatest journalists this country has
Speaker 2: ever produced, having risked and gave their lives literally and
Speaker 2: figuratively to change the world through their words and images.
Speaker 2: On their shoulders, women continued to stand in the fearless
Speaker 2: pursuit of truth. Yet, despite their accomplishments, another little known
Speaker 2: fact is that most journalists today are women. It's another
Speaker 2: important reason that we continue to celebrate women, particularly those
Speaker 2: in journalism today with my very special guest. She has
Speaker 2: boldly carried on the tradition of great women journalists that
Speaker 2: have come before her, as demonstrated in her roles as
Speaker 2: a leader, producer, reporter, author, teacher and mother. Beth Noble
Speaker 2: had a twenty year career as a journalist before a
Speaker 2: joining Fordham University in two thousand and seven as Assistant
Speaker 2: Professor of Communication and Media Studies. From nineteen ninety nine
Speaker 2: to two thousand and six, she was the Moscow Bureau
Speaker 2: chief for CBS News. In nine years at CBS News,
Speaker 2: she worked as both an on air correspondent as well
Speaker 2: as a producer. She is a recipient of an Emmy
Speaker 2: Award for coverage of the two thousand and two Moscow
Speaker 2: Theater siege, and Edward R. Murrow and Sigma Delta Caya
Speaker 2: Awards for coverage of the two thousand and four Beslan
Speaker 2: School siege. Doctor Noble spent fourteen years living in Moscow,
Speaker 2: where she worked for the Los Angeles Times, the Television
Speaker 2: News Agency, Worldwide Television News, and the production company Feature
Speaker 2: Story before joining CBS News. Earlier in her career, she
Speaker 2: worked for the Columbia Daily Spectator and Governance the Harvard
Speaker 2: Journal of Public Policy. Doctor Noble received a master's and
Speaker 2: doctoral degrees in public policy from Harvard University and her
Speaker 2: bachelor's in political science from bar Arnard College, Columbia University.
Speaker 2: In twenty ten, doctor Noble co authored a guidebook for
Speaker 2: young journalists with CBS News legend Mike Wallace, Heat and
Speaker 2: Light Advice for the next generation of journalists. She also
Speaker 2: wrote a book in twenty eighteen on how watchdoor reporting
Speaker 2: has fared in the Internet era. She also studies the
Speaker 2: effective media on politics in Russia. At Fordham, doctor Noble
Speaker 2: teaches hands on courses in multimedia journalism, journalism history, and
Speaker 2: press politics. She serves as the advisor to the student
Speaker 2: newspaper on Fordham's Bronx campus, The RAM. Outside of Fordham,
Speaker 2: Doctor Noble currently serves as a judge for the News
Speaker 2: and Documentary Emmy Awards, as a board member of the
Speaker 2: Overseas Press Club of America and as a trustee of
Speaker 2: the Columbia Daily Spectator. She is also a third degree
Speaker 2: black belt in Taekwondo. I call her the Renaissance Woman.
Speaker 2: A deep breath and my friend and colleague, welcome, doctor Bethson.
Speaker 2: I appreciate you for taking the time. Obviously we're very busy.
Speaker 1: Well, thanks, Frank. It's always great to be with you.
Speaker 1: You know. I love talking with you on this podcast.
Speaker 1: You do such a great job of drilling down into
Speaker 1: people's careers, into issues that we should all be thinking about.
Speaker 1: It's just a total pleasure to be with you.
Speaker 2: I really appreciate that, and I have to ask you.
Speaker 2: I have to give you one more accolade. I always
Speaker 2: called our other colleague, doctor Paul Levinson from Ford and
Speaker 2: the renaissance Man. If he is a renaissance man, you
Speaker 2: must be the renaissance woman. Let's establish that right off
Speaker 2: the bat. Let's move on with our discussion. You know, Beth,
Speaker 2: and you mentioned I like to get to know our
Speaker 2: people beyond their professionalism because it helps to form what
Speaker 2: they are as professionals. So I'd like to ask you,
Speaker 2: did you always dream of becoming a journalist when you
Speaker 2: were when you were a kid growing up, was was
Speaker 2: that foremost in your thinking?
Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks for the question, Frank. You know, I'm a
Speaker 1: New York City kid. I grew up in Queen's. I
Speaker 1: grew up in a middle class family, went to the
Speaker 1: New York City public schools, and I was really lucky
Speaker 1: to go to Stuyvesant High School. This was back in
Speaker 1: the days when normal people kind of got into Stuyvesant,
Speaker 1: who hadn't studied for eight years for the entrance exam
Speaker 1: as they do now, and so it was really it's
Speaker 1: Stuyvesant that I started to get interested in media, although
Speaker 1: apparently I did once when I was about eleven, I
Speaker 1: wrote to the New York Post trying to get a
Speaker 1: job as a sports reporter, and for some reason I
Speaker 1: didn't get it. But at Divesant there was a whole
Speaker 1: scene of both kind of official media like the school
Speaker 1: newspaper and unofficial media. There were all these people just
Speaker 1: sort of self publishing magazines, and so I started working
Speaker 1: on magazines and I just thought this is a really
Speaker 1: cool thing to do, Like there was just something about
Speaker 1: the process of informing people that I just found so
Speaker 1: important and interesting. I did an internship senior year of
Speaker 1: high school at The Villager, which is a local paper.
Speaker 1: It still exists in a West village, and so they
Speaker 1: sent me out to report stories and I was like,
Speaker 1: this is the coolest job in the world, to get
Speaker 1: to get paid to talk to people like I'm good.
Speaker 1: And so I went to college, and you know, it
Speaker 1: was incredibly fortunate to go to Barnard College, which at
Speaker 1: the time was the Women's college of Columbia University. Now
Speaker 1: this is before Columbia was college was co ed, and
Speaker 1: I kind of majored in the Columbia Daily Spectator. It
Speaker 1: was a five day week paper. We had to lay
Speaker 1: it out. They don't lay it out anymore, only once
Speaker 1: a week, and the SPEC's motto was success without college.
Speaker 1: I probably skipped a few too many classes, but I
Speaker 1: really learned how to be a journalist, and that's what
Speaker 1: really gave me the fire. Now and as you said
Speaker 1: in your in I serve as one of the alumni
Speaker 1: trustees of the Columbia Spectator, and I'm just in total
Speaker 1: awe of the high quality journalism that those students do.
Speaker 1: I look at the quality of the reporting and the
Speaker 1: multimedia work than they do, and they're you know, doing
Speaker 1: social media, and they're doing videos and they're doing reporting.
Speaker 1: Their work covering the protests at Columbia over the last
Speaker 1: year has been absolutely remarkable. I'm so incredibly proud of
Speaker 1: those students. And then I ended up becoming a professional
Speaker 1: journalist in Russia. After I finished graduate school, I started
Speaker 1: writing about Mikhail Gorbachev, started going to Russia, fell in
Speaker 1: love with a Russian journalist who I eventually married and
Speaker 1: then later divorced. But it was nineteen ninety when I
Speaker 1: started going to Russia and everything was changing. Communism was
Speaker 1: falling apart before my eyes. And so when I decided
Speaker 1: to move there in nineteen ninety two, the only thing
Speaker 1: I knew how to do was be a journalist, and
Speaker 1: I was really lucky to get some really great jobs
Speaker 1: in Moscow and learn the language, ending up with CBS,
Speaker 1: which is where we met, and you know, is still
Speaker 1: a place where I have a relationship. I help with
Speaker 1: their Russia coverage still, and you know, I'm just so
Speaker 1: incredibly grateful to have been able to work as a journalist,
Speaker 1: to be able to travel around the world. And you know,
Speaker 1: if I if I am an activist in any way,
Speaker 1: it's that I'm an activist for the truth. Like I
Speaker 1: really believe in the First Amendment. I really believe in
Speaker 1: giving people the information that they need as citizens to
Speaker 1: make decisions about their lives. And that's that's one of
Speaker 1: the things I think we both bring to the classroom
Speaker 1: at FORDOM trying to empower students to dig deep and
Speaker 1: to find the truths and and to share the truths,
Speaker 1: even even when it's not pretty.
Speaker 2: Beats. Did you have in your career an epiphany moment,
Speaker 2: if you will, when it would you really realize I
Speaker 2: can do this, I belong here. Was there one moment
Speaker 2: or a series of something that you can point to
Speaker 2: that says, yeah, this is where I this is where
Speaker 2: I am, this is where I belong.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, that's a good question. I think I
Speaker 1: had a bunch of them along the way. Like the
Speaker 1: first time I got an article into the Columbia Spectator,
Speaker 1: it was like, oh, I can do this. You know.
Speaker 1: When I got a job, I worked for the Los
Speaker 1: Angeles Times. That was my first job in Moscow, and
Speaker 1: that was like, Wow, somebody's hiring me to be a
Speaker 1: you know, work in a foreign bureau. This is incredible.
Speaker 1: But I think maybe like the pinnacle for me was
Speaker 1: in two thousand and two, CBS sent me on a
Speaker 1: rotation to Cobble, Afghanistan for a month. This was after
Speaker 1: the fighting had ended, and I spent about a month
Speaker 1: in Afghanistan with Elizabeth Palmer, who's a dear friend and
Speaker 1: you know, still a wonderful correspondent now based in the
Speaker 1: CBS B bureau in Moscow. She was the Mosque's she's
Speaker 1: based in London, CBSNE and she was the Moscow correspondent
Speaker 1: for a couple of years. And I remember driving around
Speaker 1: Cobble and particularly driving across the Schmali plane north of
Speaker 1: Cobble and passing these herders living in tents with their goats,
Speaker 1: and I just thought, Wow, this is a moment, What
Speaker 1: an incredible opportunity to go to a place like Afghanistan
Speaker 1: that I would never ever in a million years go
Speaker 1: to such a historic and interesting place, and to get
Speaker 1: to tell stories to Americans, to make them care about
Speaker 1: a place that is so outside of their everyday life
Speaker 1: but has important implications for our country, for national security.
Speaker 1: So yeah, sometimes I look at my life and I
Speaker 1: kind of want to pinch myself about.
Speaker 2: How it was expressional all the time. How they wind
Speaker 2: up here this is cool, and you do wind up
Speaker 2: pinching yourself and you never forget where you came from,
Speaker 2: at least I don't. I'm sure you don't either, you know, Beth.
Speaker 2: I think we make one to elaborate. I mentioned three
Speaker 2: women in the opening, and we were discussing them a
Speaker 2: little bit before emailer Martha Gelhorn and Marie called it.
Speaker 2: All of them were war correspondents and covered conflict. One
Speaker 2: of them actually killed in action, Marie Colvin, who was
Speaker 2: warned not to go back, and her response was, but
Speaker 2: I have to. So I and the others were not
Speaker 2: necessarily killed in action, but we're in a sense lost
Speaker 2: to the wars they covered, if you will, many similar
Speaker 2: that many soldiers experience with PTSD coming back from war.
Speaker 2: I mean, they could appear and they had great careers,
Speaker 2: but they never lose what they've seen. So talk and again,
Speaker 2: you've been in war zones. Talk about some of the challenges,
Speaker 2: particularly unique challenges that women and journalists in that situation
Speaker 2: face that perhaps maybe their male counterpart don't encounter on
Speaker 2: the same level. Can you talk to that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Sure, Oh my gosh, how much time do we have.
Speaker 1: I remember, you know, so many, so many times where
Speaker 1: reporting in Russia where people kind of looked to me
Speaker 1: with curiosity and maybe a little bit of shock. And
Speaker 1: this is, you know, not like fifty years ago. This
Speaker 1: is more contemporary. You know, those women you mentioned had
Speaker 1: amazing careers. I mean Murray Colvin who was killed in Syria,
Speaker 1: you know, was told like, what you're doing is crazy, dangerous,
Speaker 1: and she did it anyway. I'm not that kind of journalist.
Speaker 1: I admire those kinds of journalists. If there are bullets flying,
Speaker 1: I would like rather be back in my safe space
Speaker 1: than out there. It is one of the reasons I
Speaker 1: have such respect for those frontline journalists. But I can
Speaker 1: think of times where, you know, people looked at me
Speaker 1: in Russia and was like, you're a woman, what are
Speaker 1: you doing here?
Speaker 2: Why?
Speaker 1: Where's where's your husband? Why is he letting you do this.
Speaker 1: In nineteen ninety seven, I was working for I think
Speaker 1: it was ninety seven, it might have been ninety six.
Speaker 1: I was working for Worldwide Television News and I made
Speaker 1: a trip to Chechenya and was living in Grosny for
Speaker 1: about ten days, and we were living in a house.
Speaker 1: The group of us from WTN and also some of
Speaker 1: our some other television clients with a family in the
Speaker 1: center of Grosny and they kind of had a guest
Speaker 1: house that they gave us. And this family had numerous
Speaker 1: daughters kind of running from you know, twenties down to
Speaker 1: you know, five years old, and these women were fascinated
Speaker 1: by me. And I speak Russian and so they could
Speaker 1: talk to me, and they were like, what do you
Speaker 1: what are you doing? You're a woman? Where's your husband?
Speaker 1: How does he allow you to do this? Do American
Speaker 1: women work? Is this normal? And they weren't being you know,
Speaker 1: mean or anything. They were just incredibly curious to see
Speaker 1: a woman in a very different role than they were
Speaker 1: used to in Chechena. Which is not to say the
Speaker 1: Chechen women and don't work. They absolutely do work. But
Speaker 1: it was kind of like a little mini lesson in
Speaker 1: feminism for these young Chechen women to sort of say, look,
Speaker 1: you know you hopefully you can do whatever you want,
Speaker 1: and you know, it's important for people of all kinds
Speaker 1: of different backgrounds to be telling stories.
Speaker 2: You know. Statistic I mentioned that literally the majority of
Speaker 2: journalists today are women. And I did a little research
Speaker 2: and it's just under fifty four percent by the latest survey,
Speaker 2: And I have to be honest, that surprised me, although
Speaker 2: it shouldn't because I've noticed in recent years the tremendous
Speaker 2: increase in female students I have in my class on
Speaker 2: journalism and a multimedia production sometimes where the great majority
Speaker 2: out of twelve or fourteen students, ten or twelve are women.
Speaker 2: So that kinds of does it surprise you at all
Speaker 2: to find so many? And why do you think women,
Speaker 2: despite the difficulties, are still attracted to it as a profession.
Speaker 1: Well, at Fordham, our major in journalism, our department in
Speaker 1: Communication Media Studies is overwhelmingly women, I think maybe sixty
Speaker 1: five sixty eight percent women, and FOREDAM is overwhelmingly women
Speaker 1: students as a university. So I think it's really great
Speaker 1: that more women are going into journalism. When I was
Speaker 1: coming up, for example, at the Columbia Daily Spectator, the
Speaker 1: staff was overwhelmingly male and overwhelmingly white. By the way,
Speaker 1: I don't think the Spectator had its first editor female
Speaker 1: editor in chief until after I had gone been the editor,
Speaker 1: and that was I believe, about one hundred years into
Speaker 1: its history. Yeah, I think it was a woman in
Speaker 1: the class of nineteen eighty seven. It was the first
Speaker 1: few editor in chief, which is probably about one hundred
Speaker 1: and nine years into Spectator's history. You know, everybody brings
Speaker 1: their own perspectives to their work as a journalist, and
Speaker 1: certainly my view of the world has been deeply colored
Speaker 1: by being a woman and also by being a mother.
Speaker 1: In two thousand and four, we were covering the school
Speaker 1: siege in the town of Beslon, where as I'm sure
Speaker 1: most listeners will remember, a group of Chechen terrorists took
Speaker 1: an entire school hostage, mostly children and some of their
Speaker 1: parents who were bringing them to school for the first day,
Speaker 1: which has usually a little ceremony, and those people were
Speaker 1: held in a school gym for three days in sweltering heat.
Speaker 1: The gym was leased with bombs that would go off
Speaker 1: if the Russian forces tried to attack. It was awful
Speaker 1: talking about PTSD. I definitely felt the effects of having
Speaker 1: covered that story for many, many weeks and months afterwards.
Speaker 1: But I was covering that story and all I could
Speaker 1: kept thinking about was, Wow, what if my kid were
Speaker 1: in there, who was four years old at the time,
Speaker 1: And I just thought, you know, he's such a chatterbox.
Speaker 1: He would never have been able to shut up and
Speaker 1: sit there for hours and hours in a hot gym
Speaker 1: with no water and no food, and so my empathy
Speaker 1: for the people in that gym was very deeply colored
Speaker 1: by my own experience as a mother. So I think
Speaker 1: it's really great. At the Spectator when I was there,
Speaker 1: the women, I don't know, we're ten or twenty percent
Speaker 1: of the staff. So again, right now, I look at
Speaker 1: the staff of the Columbia Spectator. It's a majority woman.
Speaker 1: Most of their editors in chief for the last ten
Speaker 1: years have been women. Most sometimes they're all female managing boards,
Speaker 1: you know. And it's good. The more kinds of voices
Speaker 1: and the more kinds of people we can have in
Speaker 1: journalism telling different stories in different ways, the stronger journal
Speaker 1: is going to be overall.
Speaker 2: You know. I want to talk a little bit about
Speaker 2: and you had mentioned it, and I've experienced it also,
Speaker 2: and it's interesting you hear it often discuss amongst first responders,
Speaker 2: military people PTSD, But as journalists, we also are very
Speaker 2: close to extreme tragedy, and you have to deal with that.
Speaker 2: I think when we're working, we don't necessarily think about
Speaker 2: it because the work occupies your mind. It's in the
Speaker 2: quieter moments afterwards. I remember reflecting after nine to eleven,
Speaker 2: having spent two weeks at Ground zero, and then also
Speaker 2: the Sandy Hook Elementary shootings, busy, busy, terrible weather and
Speaker 2: not thinking about it, but afterwards coming to terms with
Speaker 2: what we've just seen and documented. And I guess we
Speaker 2: all have methods of dealing with what is yours. And
Speaker 2: you mentioned how for months you were suffering with PTSD.
Speaker 2: How do you prepare and if you know assignment's going
Speaker 2: to be difficulty, do you mentally prepare yourself? And then
Speaker 2: afterwards what are some of your methods of coping?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think you know it's it's really hard to
Speaker 1: be a journalist sometimes, And one of the things I
Speaker 1: do in my classes at Fordham is to warn the
Speaker 1: students that being a journalist is a bit like maybe
Speaker 1: being in the army, where you know, you get the
Speaker 1: order to fall out and you've got to do it,
Speaker 1: and you sometimes you get on a plane to cover
Speaker 1: a story and you have no idea how long it's
Speaker 1: going to go and what's going to happen, and you
Speaker 1: have to be able to kind of roll with the punches,
Speaker 1: and that you also have to be able to kind
Speaker 1: of compartmentalize a little bit and sort of take your
Speaker 1: own emotions and go, Okay, I have my emotions, I
Speaker 1: have my feelings. I bring you know, I'm not objective
Speaker 1: about certain things in my life, but like I'm going
Speaker 1: to be a journalist, I'm going to kind of put
Speaker 1: on my journalist hat now and then push those feelings
Speaker 1: to the side, and I'll come back to them and
Speaker 1: deal with them. So in in Beslan, you know, it
Speaker 1: was tragic. We would interview people who had lost their
Speaker 1: whole family, and they would cry through the interview, and
Speaker 1: then we would cry through the interview. At points our
Speaker 1: cameraman said, like, I can't even see what I'm shooting anymore.
Speaker 1: I'm crying so much that it's just a big blur.
Speaker 1: But afterwards, I, you know, I had dreams about Beslan
Speaker 1: and about being held hostage, you know, for many, many
Speaker 1: weeks after that event, and so, you know, you talk
Speaker 1: about it, you try to process it. One of the
Speaker 1: things that I'm very proud of as an alum of
Speaker 1: CBS is that I always found them to be very
Speaker 1: understanding when people were like, Hey, I've just covered a war,
Speaker 1: I've just covered a terrorist act. I might need a
Speaker 1: couple of days off or I, you know, I'm going
Speaker 1: to seek some counseling and try to work through this,
Speaker 1: and they've been My experience was that they were extremely
Speaker 1: supportive in this. You know, I've saw, you know, a
Speaker 1: lot of colleagues cover some really horrible things and that's
Speaker 1: just part of the job. And I think you have
Speaker 1: to go into the job knowing that you're going to
Speaker 1: see the worst of humanity, but the upside is that
Speaker 1: you also get to see the best of humanity. Going
Speaker 1: back to Beslan, we were, you know, interviewing these people
Speaker 1: who lost their whole families, and then at the end
Speaker 1: of the interviews, these people were like, Hey, do you
Speaker 1: need a bathroom? Hey are you hungry? Hey can we
Speaker 1: feed you? Do you need a place to stay? Do
Speaker 1: you on our internet Wi fi? You know, what can
Speaker 1: we do for you? And I remember thinking, these people
Speaker 1: have just gone through the worst days of their life,
Speaker 1: and yet they're being so kind to us, Like, what
Speaker 1: does that tell you about the human condition? It tells
Speaker 1: you that even at the worst of times, people can
Speaker 1: be at their very best. And those lessons have definitely
Speaker 1: stayed with me through my career.
Speaker 2: You know, Beth, it was a question I was going
Speaker 2: to ask after the break. I think it's more appropriate
Speaker 2: it now, and it's something it's rhetorical, but we can
Speaker 2: talk about it. It's something I call the myth of
Speaker 2: total impartiality, which we as journalists are supposed to go
Speaker 2: in totally objective, but that's not in my mind, and
Speaker 2: I talk about it with my students. Is not entirely realistic.
Speaker 2: And you were mentioning Beslon et cetera, where there's a
Speaker 2: situation where there is good and there is evil and
Speaker 2: it has to be reported as such. I mean, there's
Speaker 2: an internet meme that says something about what journalism is.
Speaker 2: If it's if somebody's asking if it's raining outside, you
Speaker 2: really don't debate it. You put your head out of
Speaker 2: the window, you find out if it's raining or not.
Speaker 2: I'd like to see your thoughts on that. As I said,
Speaker 2: the idea of it is to approach with objectivity and fairness.
Speaker 2: But at some point, as you dig a story, as
Speaker 2: I said, there are villains and there are heroes, and
Speaker 2: what role does a journalist play in highlighting one over
Speaker 2: the other.
Speaker 1: Your thoughts, Yeah, thanks, Frank, that's a really good and
Speaker 1: important question. And I think a lot of people who
Speaker 1: haven't been journalists or don't think a lot about journalism,
Speaker 1: don't really understand the high aspirations that most journalists have
Speaker 1: for themselves, who are, you know, working in the mainstream media,
Speaker 1: you know, to put their own prejudices aside and just
Speaker 1: focus on what's true and getting to it. So I
Speaker 1: spend a lot of my time covering the war in Ukraine.
Speaker 1: No obviously, you know, most people would look at any
Speaker 1: war like that and just say, oh, this is this
Speaker 1: is so sad, this is a terrible thing. I hope
Speaker 1: this war ends so fewer innocent people will die. Everybody
Speaker 1: always has some feelings that they bring to a story,
Speaker 1: and so the aspiration is to put those aside and
Speaker 1: focus on the facts, focus on fairness, focus on being balanced.
Speaker 1: And it can be really hard to do that. Sometimes
Speaker 1: reporting about the Ukraine War, where I do have strong
Speaker 1: personal feelings is challenging, but I always try to be
Speaker 1: fair and accurate in what I say about it, even
Speaker 1: though you know, now the work that I do for
Speaker 1: CBS is really punditry. They'll come to me and be like, hey,
Speaker 1: this thing happened, how do we interpret it? What does
Speaker 1: it mean? What do you think? And even in that
Speaker 1: role where I actually can, you know, let my opinions go,
Speaker 1: I tend not to. I try to just sort of
Speaker 1: add fact and add information to help people interpret it
Speaker 1: for themselves. So I think it's important to know and
Speaker 1: remember that journalism is a profession. It has standards, it
Speaker 1: has practices that are widely adapted, and the standards for
Speaker 1: journalism transcend the medium. So, for example, the Society of
Speaker 1: Professional Journalists has a set of standards that it says
Speaker 1: journalisms should act according to, and that's, you know, seeking
Speaker 1: the truth above all else, being fair and balanced, being accountable,
Speaker 1: being transparent, and that doesn't matter if you're you know,
Speaker 1: doing your journalism via TikTok videos or your reporting for
Speaker 1: the New York Times of CBS. Those are aspirations that
Speaker 1: we all have. And I think it's it's really important
Speaker 1: for people to remember that journalists are, you know, almost always,
Speaker 1: certainly mainstream media journalists are always aspiring to put their
Speaker 1: personal feelings aside and just focus on what's actually true.
Speaker 2: And I'm going to get back to that with the book,
Speaker 2: your most recent book, The Watchdog still barks when I
Speaker 2: think it's relative but before that, you wrote another book
Speaker 2: with the legend, as we mentioned Mike Wallace from sixty Minutes,
Speaker 2: called Heat and Light, Advice for the Next Generation of
Speaker 2: jo Journalists. Tell us about that, how you came to
Speaker 2: do it with Mike Wallace, what you hope to accomplish
Speaker 2: with it, and where it is now if you would.
Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks, Frank. So if anybody doesn't know, Mike Wallace
Speaker 1: was one of the founding correspondents of sixty Minutes. He
Speaker 1: started on the program in nineteen sixty eight and stayed
Speaker 1: on it until his late eighties. He's the American journalist
Speaker 1: who made it fashionable and acceptable to ask a hard question.
Speaker 1: It sounds hard to believe, but back in the fifties
Speaker 1: journalists were, you know, not didn't want to ask really
Speaker 1: hard questions and make the people they were interviewing feel uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: And Mike was like, the heck with that. And so
Speaker 1: we worked together twice. When I was at CBS. He
Speaker 1: came to interview bars Jeltzon in two thousand and then
Speaker 1: he came to interview Vladimir Putin in two thousand and five,
Speaker 1: and so we got to know each other, and he
Speaker 1: had a reputation of being quite the tiger in his
Speaker 1: early years. By the time I worked with him, he
Speaker 1: was in his eighties and he was kind of a
Speaker 1: pussy cat and we got along very well, and so
Speaker 1: I had him come to visit Fordom and give a
Speaker 1: talk to students, and he was he was so Mike Wallace.
Speaker 1: He just people started asking him questions and then he
Speaker 1: I remember he was wearing a lavit le or mic
Speaker 1: so he could move around, and he like literally left
Speaker 1: the place where we were sitting, walked into the audience
Speaker 1: and started questioning the students about things and having a
Speaker 1: conversation with them, and it was so good that I
Speaker 1: called him the next day to thank him, and I said,
Speaker 1: you know, you really ought to write a book about
Speaker 1: how to do journalism, because your view of what it
Speaker 1: is is a little bit different than kind of the
Speaker 1: classic canon of journalism. And I said, you know, if
Speaker 1: you want, we could do it together. And much to
Speaker 1: my surprise and delight, he said, that's a great idea.
Speaker 1: Let's do it together. And so I started going to
Speaker 1: his apartment in New York and I made a list
Speaker 1: of like the two hundred and fifty most basic questions
Speaker 1: of doing journalism, like what's a story news? How do
Speaker 1: you know who to interview? How do you know you
Speaker 1: haven't forgotten to ask something important? What are your ethics?
Speaker 1: How do you think about following the law? You walk
Speaker 1: into an edit room and you've got thirty hours of material,
Speaker 1: how do you combit down and make it a story?
Speaker 1: And so we just started talking and I ran a
Speaker 1: tape and we just talked and talked and talked and
Speaker 1: talk to talk and then I went out and interviewed
Speaker 1: about thirty other people to have their impressions of the
Speaker 1: in the book as well. And yeah, we had a
Speaker 1: great time. And I think other than the fact that
Speaker 1: it doesn't really cover the internet because it came out
Speaker 1: in twenty ten, I think it really the book stands
Speaker 1: up in terms of the way it explains the way
Speaker 1: to do news gathering and the importance of journalism. And yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a really good book. It's still it's still out there.
Speaker 1: I know some people are still using it. And it's
Speaker 1: really the book that I wish I had had when
Speaker 1: I was say, entering college and wanted to go work
Speaker 1: at the Spectator and really wanted to know what journalism
Speaker 1: was all about.
Speaker 2: You know, it's a perfect segue into your latest book
Speaker 2: that you mentioned how reporting has fared in the Internet era,
Speaker 2: The Watchdog Still Bark. So that's kind of the follow
Speaker 2: up because we know the Internet has changed everything, and
Speaker 2: you mentioned, you know, being a journalist is more than
Speaker 2: just a title, it's training, it's ethics. All that comes
Speaker 2: together so that people at least should trust that you've
Speaker 2: done your due diligence, your research, etc. The Internet some
Speaker 2: people still practice that, but because it's relatively anonymous, it's
Speaker 2: changed anything everything. But you wrote, you literally wrote the book.
Speaker 2: So how do you feel the Internet has changed news
Speaker 2: gathering in journalism for the better, for the worst or
Speaker 2: what are your feelings?
Speaker 1: Yeah, good question. So the book that I wrote, The
Speaker 1: The Watchdog Still Barks, was looking at newspapers, nine newspapers
Speaker 1: kind of you know, big ones, medium sized, and small
Speaker 1: ones to sort of say how much are they able
Speaker 1: to dig into the watchdog role of the government and
Speaker 1: big business given that their staffs are getting smaller and
Speaker 1: smaller and smaller. And so I thought the book was
Speaker 1: going to be documenting the fact that watchdog reporting was
Speaker 1: going away, and much to my surprise when I actually
Speaker 1: started looking at the data, it actually showed that a
Speaker 1: lot of the newspapers had expanded their watchdog reporting. A
Speaker 1: good example is the Atlanta Journal Constitution, which decided to
Speaker 1: put some kind of accountability story on its front page
Speaker 1: every single day rather than to make sure that it
Speaker 1: was acting as a vibrant watchdog over the government. And
Speaker 1: so I then interviewed editors at all of the papers
Speaker 1: I studied, and including the Washington Post and the New
Speaker 1: York Times and papers in places like Idaho and Florida
Speaker 1: and upstate New York, and all the editors said the
Speaker 1: same thing to me, which is, we need to do
Speaker 1: watchdog journalism because if we don't do it, no one's
Speaker 1: going to do it. And it's the thing that our
Speaker 1: readers actually really feel is worth paying for. So I
Speaker 1: think if I extend my research only went through twenty eleven,
Speaker 1: but I think if I did it now, I might
Speaker 1: find very different results than I did then. And so
Speaker 1: one of the things that I'm working on now is
Speaker 1: actually looking at these independent journalists. I came to be
Speaker 1: interested in this through a student who's currently writing her
Speaker 1: bachelor's thesis at FORDAM about these new independent journalists who
Speaker 1: do journalism on platforms like TikTok and YouTube. So one
Speaker 1: really good example of this is a guy named Johnny
Speaker 1: Harris who's a journalist. He has a good background, he
Speaker 1: worked at all kinds of different organizations and now he's
Speaker 1: on his own and so he'll make like a twenty
Speaker 1: minute video about like who is Vladimir Putin? And for
Speaker 1: some of his videos, he's going out into the field
Speaker 1: and interviewing people and doing kind of very classic journalism.
Speaker 1: And sometimes he's not actually interviewing anyone, he's just curating pictures,
Speaker 1: curating information and putting it into a package that's very
Speaker 1: slick looking and very informative. But isn't you know, the
Speaker 1: kind of typical journalism that you and I would have
Speaker 1: done at CBS. And he is something like six million
Speaker 1: followers on YouTube, so there's definitely marketing. Yeah, there's been
Speaker 1: definitely an audience for this. But the question is, well, like,
Speaker 1: is this journalism? Where does content begin and where does
Speaker 1: journalism end? And what are the ethics that he's subject to?
Speaker 1: Is he's still subject to the same standards and practices
Speaker 1: as somebody working for a mainstream news organization. So this
Speaker 1: is one of the things that I'm working on now
Speaker 1: and thinking about because I think you could really disagree
Speaker 1: about the extent to which some of what these people
Speaker 1: are doing as journalism, and then you could look at
Speaker 1: others and look at what they're doing, these independent journalists,
Speaker 1: and be like, that's still classic journalism, where the reporters
Speaker 1: going out and interviewing people and such.
Speaker 2: Another thing you're working on is you're studying the influence
Speaker 2: of the Internet and social media on politics in Russia. Certainly,
Speaker 2: very very timely, tell us, tell us more. What are
Speaker 2: you trying to show and accomplish with that study?
Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks, rank So I wrote an article maybe two
Speaker 1: years ago about No, it had to be more than that.
Speaker 1: It was like three years ago because it was before
Speaker 1: the Ukraine War. I wrote a journal article about a
Speaker 1: cool Russian television show called Big Game Alshaya Igra, and
Speaker 1: the idea of this political talk show was to have
Speaker 1: the American and Russian views contrasted. And so there was
Speaker 1: an American in quote Mark's host, an ethnic you know,
Speaker 1: a Russian emigrate to America named Dimitri Simes, who's you know,
Speaker 1: a very well known author. He was an advisor to
Speaker 1: Richard Nixon. He headed the Nixon Center for many years
Speaker 1: and then he was kind of the American host, and
Speaker 1: then there was a Russian host as well, a parliamentarian,
Speaker 1: and so the idea of the show was America thinks
Speaker 1: this and Russia thinks this. And so I'm hoping now
Speaker 1: to go back and study this show after the start
Speaker 1: of the Ukraine War and show as an example how
Speaker 1: Russian state propaganda to sell this war to the Russian
Speaker 1: people is reflected in this one show. And so they
Speaker 1: were definitely speaking a lot about Ukraine in the shows
Speaker 1: that I studied. But now Russian television has become even
Speaker 1: more propagandas that it was three or five years ago.
Speaker 1: My my, I do sometimes watch Russian TV and it's
Speaker 1: they have a lot of political talk shows, a lot
Speaker 1: of them, a lot, a lot, a lot, and people
Speaker 1: on them are just, you know, going on tirades against
Speaker 1: America and against the West all the time. So I
Speaker 1: think this one show is an interesting microcosm, and I
Speaker 1: have a feeling it's not really showing the American point
Speaker 1: of view anymore. I think it's mostly just all the
Speaker 1: Russian point of view. But we'll see as I do
Speaker 1: more research.
Speaker 2: Some people might call that Fox News in the United
Speaker 2: States here in terms of very pointed, very pointed political
Speaker 2: point of view, you know, and it's a good segue, Beth.
Speaker 2: We're gonna take a little break, but when we come back,
Speaker 2: it's perfect timing to talk a little bit about what
Speaker 2: really can only be qualified as an assolved by the
Speaker 2: Trump administration on the First Amendment. We've seen them attack CBS,
Speaker 2: the AP, Reuters and so on and so forth, and
Speaker 2: we can see it where in my mind it's slowly
Speaker 2: being turned that the administration wants to see in his
Speaker 2: own personal propaganda machine, very similar to what's happening in Russia.
Speaker 2: I think we need to discuss that a little bit
Speaker 2: when we come back. I also want to talk a
Speaker 2: little bit about your martial arts and let people know
Speaker 2: you into taekwondos when I said the Renaissance woman, what's
Speaker 2: in kidding? Beth has been great so far, my very
Speaker 2: special guest, doctor Beth Noble, an expert in all things media.
Speaker 2: Our background is so broad. We'll leave it at that.
Speaker 2: We have so much more to discuss here on being Frank,
Speaker 2: I'm your host, Frank Lebono. There'll be more intelligent conversation
Speaker 2: coming up right after these brief commercial messages. Please don't
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Speaker 1: This is Hudson River Radio dot com.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to Being Frank, the Intelligent Conversation podcast. Thanks
Speaker 2: for sticking with us. I'm your host, Frank Robono. Of
Speaker 2: course our engineer as always as the mailman, mister Neil Richter.
Speaker 2: We'll be back with our special guest, doctor Beth Noble
Speaker 2: in just a few seconds. I just want to remind
Speaker 2: you that we bring our audience a fresh topic just
Speaker 2: about every week, and we stream from Hudson River Radio,
Speaker 2: which is located in beautiful and historic Stony Point, New York.
Speaker 2: But you can also catch Being Frank anywhere you get
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Speaker 2: website Hudson Riverradio dot com. Just click on the icon
Speaker 2: and you're there. Okay, let's continue our conversation with Beth Nobles,
Speaker 2: talking a lot about journalism. What it means a free press, etc.
Speaker 2: Best incredible career, and it brings us to a very
Speaker 2: important topic. And that's what I see as an assault
Speaker 2: on the First Amendment and the ramifications we've seen the
Speaker 2: current administration sue CBS News, ban the AP from the
Speaker 2: White House, etc. So there are moves in place at
Speaker 2: least it seems to me to be able to control
Speaker 2: the free press. And it's something that in my mind,
Speaker 2: we can have. But let's talk to a person who's
Speaker 2: more eminently qualified than I am. Best noble, what are
Speaker 2: your feelings?
Speaker 1: Oh boy, how much time do we have, Frank, So
Speaker 1: we have an hour.
Speaker 2: As much time as we need to talk about this
Speaker 2: very important topic.
Speaker 1: Please, it's this is a very concerning time for the
Speaker 1: media and for the press. You know, I spent fourteen
Speaker 1: years living in Russia, and one of the things that
Speaker 1: I came away with from that time is that for
Speaker 1: a society to really flourish, there has to be rule
Speaker 1: of law. One of the things that you can look
Speaker 1: at Vladimir Putin's Russia having done is that there really
Speaker 1: is not rule of law there. For example, if you're
Speaker 1: accused of a crime, there's no reason to believe that
Speaker 1: you would get a fair trial because the judiciary branch
Speaker 1: is under the control of the president, and in fact,
Speaker 1: you know, their rates of finding people guilty are like
Speaker 1: in the high nineties. It almost doesn't matter whether there's
Speaker 1: proof or not. And so another thing that I've picked
Speaker 1: up from living in Russia is that it's absolutely essential
Speaker 1: to a democracy to have a free and vibrant press.
Speaker 1: Our founding fathers may not have gotten everything right. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure I love the Electoral College, for example, but
Speaker 1: I do think they were very right in making sure
Speaker 1: that there was a First Amendment in place to protect
Speaker 1: the media, to protect people's rights to have free speech,
Speaker 1: to have the right of free assembly. And so it's concerning,
Speaker 1: I think for most journalists today to see free speech
Speaker 1: under attack. It's very troubling for professors to see free
Speaker 1: speech under attack. I think I'm probably a little bit
Speaker 1: more absolutist about the free about the right to free
Speaker 1: speech then a lot of people are. I really have
Speaker 1: no problem with most people saying whatever it is they want,
Speaker 1: because that's the American way. And I'll just share that.
Speaker 1: One of the things that I've been doing as the
Speaker 1: advisor to the newspaper at Foredam is that I've been
Speaker 1: working pretty closely on opinion pieces with a student who's very,
Speaker 1: very conservative, and you know very he's working with the
Speaker 1: College Republicans at FOREDAM. And when I started working with
Speaker 1: him to improve his writing, I said to him, you know,
Speaker 1: journalists don't come to me as Democrats or Republicans. Journalists
Speaker 1: come to me as journalists. And I may not agree
Speaker 1: with a point that you're making in your piece, but
Speaker 1: I'm going to help you do the best job I
Speaker 1: can of expressing your point of view clearly, so that
Speaker 1: maybe you will win some people over your point of view,
Speaker 1: or at least you will do a good job of
Speaker 1: expressing the point of view that you have on politics.
Speaker 1: And you know, some of my friends that I've shared
Speaker 1: this with are like, so, wait a minute, You're like
Speaker 1: helping a student write a piece about a point of
Speaker 1: view that you totally disagree with. And I was like, absolutely,
Speaker 1: That's exactly what I'm doing, because that's the American way.
Speaker 1: The American way is to be able to discuss things,
Speaker 1: to advocate for things, and you know, inside for them,
Speaker 1: I'll just share that people are concerned about their rights
Speaker 1: to teach in the classroom and I don't think anybody
Speaker 1: really knows what's coming down the pike next. So I
Speaker 1: think that's made journalists very worried. I think it's made
Speaker 1: professors very worried. You know, if I'm an advocate for anything,
Speaker 1: as I said earlier, I'm an advocate for the truth.
Speaker 1: You know, that's really what society needs is for the
Speaker 1: press to be free. And let's be clear, all modern
Speaker 1: presidents try to cultivate the press, good press coverage, and
Speaker 1: control the media. You know, whether that's Franklin Roosevelt having
Speaker 1: a fireside chat, or whether it's someone like Ronald Reagan
Speaker 1: who had a very sophisticated team putting together his media strategies.
Speaker 1: If you wanted Ronald Reagan to do an event, you
Speaker 1: had to explain not only why it was worth doing,
Speaker 1: but what the image on the evening news would be,
Speaker 1: what the photo on the front page of a newspaper
Speaker 1: would be, and what the headline would say. So I
Speaker 1: think presidents have been involved in controlling the media for
Speaker 1: a long long time, maybe as long as there's been media,
Speaker 1: but certainly what we're seeing today with things like the
Speaker 1: Associated Press being punished for not wanting to call the
Speaker 1: golf the golf of America. I think that is new,
Speaker 1: and I think it's it's hard for journalists to know
Speaker 1: the right way to try to combat that so that
Speaker 1: they can do their job well. And certainly for professors.
Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of my colleagues are just
Speaker 1: waiting and seeing what happens, and so it's a it's
Speaker 1: a very worrisome time. And in the long run, I think,
Speaker 1: you know what's what's best for society. You know, my
Speaker 1: tradition is that what's best for society is a is
Speaker 1: a vibrant press, press and vibrant free speech. But I
Speaker 1: understand that it can be very hard to be the
Speaker 1: subject of free speech that is going against you.
Speaker 2: Great segue, if I might want one last question relative
Speaker 2: to that, And I think you're in a unique position
Speaker 2: because of your your credentials and your intimate connection with Columbia.
Speaker 2: What's going on there with the student demonstrations and the
Speaker 2: uh the student who has been arrested H and is
Speaker 2: being deported H for le reading what the administration claims
Speaker 2: are anti Semitic protests through a Columbia and you get
Speaker 2: kind of caught between a rock and a hard place.
Speaker 2: Again with the idea of free speech. And I know
Speaker 2: your feeling is very similar to doctor Paul Evanson's, who's
Speaker 2: been a regular guest, where you know, almost unless it
Speaker 2: absolutely incites violence, direct violence, it goes. You don't have
Speaker 2: to like it. That's the point. But enough about what
Speaker 2: my feelings are towards it. What are yours? It's a
Speaker 2: very delicate balance there, Beth. Where do you see it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean I sort of come down where you and
Speaker 1: my esteemed and wonderful colleague Paul Levinson come down. Like
Speaker 1: I think it's important for us to, you know, have
Speaker 1: some speech that's shocking or that's maybe a little bit inflammatory,
Speaker 1: because that's really the tradition that allows for the information
Speaker 1: to flow that society needs to hold off authoritarianism. So,
Speaker 1: like I said, my personal barometer for free speech is
Speaker 1: set very very high. You know, I have not seen
Speaker 1: in what I've read, which obviously isn't any everything, that
Speaker 1: this student at Columbia who was detained, you know, cross
Speaker 1: that threshold. He seems to be you know, certainly Palestinian
Speaker 1: pro Palestinian. But you know, he didn't, he didn't get
Speaker 1: over my personal bar for hate speech. I know some
Speaker 1: people listening to this may may disagree, but I'll just
Speaker 1: say more generally that Colombia is in a very difficult
Speaker 1: situation right now. And as we're talking, there are apparently
Speaker 1: negotiations going on between the Columbia administration and the Trump
Speaker 1: administration about sort of things that they the Trump administration
Speaker 1: wants Columbia to do in order to get its federal
Speaker 1: grants restored. And one of the things that the Trump
Speaker 1: administration is trying to do is to push for a
Speaker 1: change in leadership and the way that it's sort of
Speaker 1: Middle Eastern Studies department is run. And I can't remember
Speaker 1: another time that I've ever heard of a government getting
Speaker 1: into the academic work of a university. And so I,
Speaker 1: you know, am in a lot of groups of professors
Speaker 1: and there's a lot of discussion right now about this.
Speaker 1: There are professors at Columbia who have signed letters and
Speaker 1: petitions saying, you know, this is not allowed. You cannot
Speaker 1: allow a government to dictate what we're going to do
Speaker 1: in the classroom. And I think if that happens, there
Speaker 1: might be people who leave Columbia, who retire, who try
Speaker 1: to start moving to other universities. Colombia is, you know,
Speaker 1: a place that formed me as an undergraduate, a place
Speaker 1: that I still have ties to through the Columbia Spectator.
Speaker 1: But I am a professor and so I deeply understand
Speaker 1: where their faculty is coming from. That we've had academic
Speaker 1: freedom to teach students as we want, and if I
Speaker 1: didn't have that myself, I don't think I could really
Speaker 1: teach journalism the way that I think it should be taught.
Speaker 1: I might be worried about saying the wrong thing, and
Speaker 1: so I think in the long run, it's the students
Speaker 1: who would suffer if freedom of speech in the classroom
Speaker 1: is impinged upon by by any administration, Republican or Democrat.
Speaker 1: It's just not to me. It's not the right thing
Speaker 1: to do. We want people to be able to speak
Speaker 1: freely in classrooms. That's why you know, cancel culture is
Speaker 1: also not appealing to me. I don't want any of
Speaker 1: my students to feel that they can't say what's on
Speaker 1: their minds.
Speaker 2: Yes, I hear it. I wouldn't teach under those circumstances
Speaker 2: that I wasn't able to speak my mind. And of
Speaker 2: course certain things are appropriate, certain things are and even
Speaker 2: politically in the classroom, but we'll leave that up to
Speaker 2: each individual. Professor. One of the things I wanted to
Speaker 2: talk about you had had with you not actively involved,
Speaker 2: but you still acknowledge the importance of the Sperber Award
Speaker 2: at Fordham, which acknowledges a book by a journalist of
Speaker 2: journalism and outstanding one every year. Tell us a little
Speaker 2: bit about the prize, where it came from, and why
Speaker 2: it's important.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so thanks for that. I'm still a juror on
Speaker 1: the on the Sperber Prize. The prize has been given.
Speaker 1: It's actually the twenty fifth anniversary, so yay, we'll be
Speaker 1: celebrating in November. You're all, you're all invited. The Sperber
Speaker 1: Prize is an award that's given by Fordham every year
Speaker 1: to the author of a memoir, biography or autobiography about
Speaker 1: a journalist or media figure, and it was endowed by
Speaker 1: the family of a writer named Anne Sperber Am. She
Speaker 1: wrote under A. M. Sperber, who wrote the biography of
Speaker 1: Edward R. Mureau, the great CBS journalist and kind of
Speaker 1: the father of modern broadcast journalism, and worked on the
Speaker 1: biography of Mura for something like ten years. The amount
Speaker 1: of research that she did in the number of people
Speaker 1: she interviewed is just it's just mind boggling. It's an amazing,
Speaker 1: amazing book. And she passed away very very early in
Speaker 1: her family in doubt this prize, and so it's kind
Speaker 1: of like a celebration of great journalism. There have been
Speaker 1: some you know, wonderful writers, you know, some a list
Speaker 1: names who have won the prize, and you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's really a pleasure to have an excuse, you know,
Speaker 1: to read read these books. One book I've been reading
Speaker 1: is a friend's book that will be out in April.
Speaker 1: Jill Dharty, the former bureau chief for CNN, has a
Speaker 1: memoir and you know, probably will consider her book for
Speaker 1: next year's prize because it's we're now reading the books
Speaker 1: that came out in twenty twenty four. This is twenty
Speaker 1: twenty five book. But they're amazing books by amazing authors.
Speaker 1: And sometimes it's people that I know, and sometimes it's
Speaker 1: journalists that I never really knew a lot about and
Speaker 1: have learned about. So it's just another way that we
Speaker 1: at Fordham are doing what we can to help keep
Speaker 1: journalism in the public eye and keep it vibrant.
Speaker 2: Now I call you the Renaissance Woman, and I mean
Speaker 2: it because of all your academic skills, but you will
Speaker 2: also hold a third dan am I saying it correctly
Speaker 2: in tayko. Since I don't have to hate, you'll forget me.
Speaker 2: But please tell us about how you got involved in taekwondo.
Speaker 2: Is important to you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know it. Thanks for asking. It's kind of
Speaker 1: a crazy story. I have a son who's now twenty four,
Speaker 1: but when he was little, he started doing taekwondo in
Speaker 1: a school called Fierce Dragon Martial Arts in our neighborhood
Speaker 1: in Queens, New York, and they had a free month
Speaker 1: for parents, and he was like, hey, Mom, why did
Speaker 1: you come to class instead of sitting on the side
Speaker 1: and watching me? You can try it? And I was like,
Speaker 1: what are you me? And so he's like, no, no, no, Mom,
Speaker 1: try and try it. So I did, and by the
Speaker 1: end of that free month, I was totally hooked and
Speaker 1: I've been doing it ever since. That was thirteen years ago,
Speaker 1: and so my son and I were the first mom
Speaker 1: son pair to make first and then second degree black
Speaker 1: belt together, which was really so special for me. And
Speaker 1: then my son went off to college and I kept going.
Speaker 1: So in May, I believe I'll be testing for my
Speaker 1: fourth degree black belt, which is kind of cool because
Speaker 1: it's the first rank of mastery, so everyone at the
Speaker 1: school will have to call me Master Noble, and I'll
Speaker 1: also be the first woman at the school to reach master.
Speaker 1: So I think like people don't understand martial arts that
Speaker 1: they think it's about hurting people and punching. It's not.
Speaker 1: It's about self confidence, it's about perseverance, it's about discipline,
Speaker 1: it's about respect. It's an incredible sport for young people.
Speaker 1: It's a great sport for young girls. There are you know,
Speaker 1: we are schools has I think close to fifty to
Speaker 1: fifty in terms of girls and boys in there, and
Speaker 1: it really helps young women gain confidence and gain perseverance
Speaker 1: because you don't get a belt like just oh I
Speaker 1: want it, I hear it is No, you got to
Speaker 1: work and you got to build up to it. So
Speaker 1: I you know, I think it's in a really appropriate
Speaker 1: time if we're talking about women's history and women's empowerment
Speaker 1: that some of your listeners like check it out, like
Speaker 1: if you have a child, or if you are a
Speaker 1: woman and you're looking for something to do for your health,
Speaker 1: like check out a local martial arts class. It's it's
Speaker 1: really great exercise. And the other thing is that when
Speaker 1: you're in a martial arts class, you can't think about
Speaker 1: anything else. You have to be there and be present
Speaker 1: and pay attention. And for me, my, you know, my
Speaker 1: job is so busy that I really love having an
Speaker 1: hour or two hours on nights and weekends where I'm
Speaker 1: not thinking about anything. I'm not thinking about the news.
Speaker 1: I'm just thinking about, Okay, someone's coming at me with
Speaker 1: a punch. What I do to protect myself.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, now I have to answer your list
Speaker 2: of already impressive titles of deck doctor, best, noble Master, best.
Speaker 1: Thanks, but not yet put.
Speaker 2: The I'm sure you whole accomplish it, as you've done
Speaker 2: everything else. Beth. I really want to thank you so much.
Speaker 2: You're such a dear friend, and I knew you took
Speaker 2: time out of a very busy schedule to be with
Speaker 2: us here at being Frank. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Frank, it's thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1: I I love coming on your show. You always ask
Speaker 1: such thoughtful and interesting questions, and you know, I think
Speaker 1: we both share so many passions about what it is
Speaker 1: we do now as journalists and as professors, and I
Speaker 1: know for sure that because I hear it from them,
Speaker 1: that your students are super lucky to be in a
Speaker 1: classroom with you and to be able to soak up
Speaker 1: so much of your understanding and knowledge about journalism. So
Speaker 1: thanks for all you do for Fordham students and as
Speaker 1: well as for your audience on the podcast.
Speaker 2: And I have to get just one plug in from
Speaker 2: my students to you. Often here today in our cancel culture, well,
Speaker 2: students are lazy and this that, and not our students.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't say that at all. Very proud of our kids,
Speaker 2: and I guess old enough actually call them kids. They're
Speaker 2: great young people. And I think part of it is
Speaker 2: the Foredom mindset, which is to create a whole person. Okay,
Speaker 2: not just an academic, but a whole person. So I'm
Speaker 2: proud to be associated with you in the whole university really.
Speaker 1: Well, and we're glad too. And you know, I learned
Speaker 1: journalism from you know, at the Columbia Spech kind of
Speaker 1: learning it from older students who were showing me. And
Speaker 1: I got the job done, but it took a long
Speaker 1: long time. And so one of the things I say
Speaker 1: to my students are you are so lucky to be,
Speaker 1: you know, have a journalism major or have a graduate
Speaker 1: program in public media that's teaching journalism, because it's just
Speaker 1: such a better process. It's faster and easier to have
Speaker 1: someone help you learn journalism rather than trying to learn
Speaker 1: it on your own. And you know, I feel like
Speaker 1: our student when I got to Fordham that we didn't
Speaker 1: have a journalism major and we didn't have the public
Speaker 1: media master's program. So I feel really happy that we do.
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you as you know, a lot of
Speaker 1: our students are doing a great job. They're getting really
Speaker 1: good jobs, and they're telling really important stories. And that's
Speaker 1: what gets me out of bed every day, to be.
Speaker 2: Honest, so happy to be part of that. Beth Noble,
Speaker 2: thank you so much for your intelligent conversation here on
Speaker 2: being Frank. It's really been my pleasure to heck out
Speaker 2: of this week.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thanks for having me Frank.
Speaker 2: You know, of course, we offer a special thanks to
Speaker 2: our listeners who take time to give us a voice
Speaker 2: in their lives. We offer a fresh topic just about
Speaker 2: every week, catch wherever and whenever you get your favorite podcasts.
Speaker 2: Check us out on the Hudson River Radio Facebook page,
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Speaker 2: always leave you with two things that are relative to
Speaker 2: our conversation, want to quote, and then some great music
Speaker 2: that has a little backstory that I was submitted by
Speaker 2: our composer friend Robert Debou and going to read that
Speaker 2: for you and sec in just a second. First from
Speaker 2: our friend Walter Cronkite, who said, our job is only
Speaker 2: to hold up the mirror to tell and show the
Speaker 2: public what has happened. I think it's a little more
Speaker 2: complex than that, but that's the basics and we'll stick
Speaker 2: to it. Okay. Some closing music comes from and again
Speaker 2: keeping with our theme of Women's History Month, a wonderful
Speaker 2: composer that most people haven't necessarily heard of. They've heard
Speaker 2: her music, but not her name. Augusta mary Anne Holmes
Speaker 2: eighteen forty seven through nineteen oh three. And this is
Speaker 2: the Triumphal March, as arranged from her march to Zoe
Speaker 2: Avs for piano by Robert de Beaux, Irish French composer.
Speaker 2: August Mary Anne Holmes was born in Paris and lived
Speaker 2: her entire life there. Her parents, well educated and upper
Speaker 2: middle class, encouraged her lifelong love of learning. She was
Speaker 2: known as a delightful and creative young girl, and spoke French, Italian,
Speaker 2: German and English, while also demonstrably precocious on piano. She
Speaker 2: was not allowed to study at the famed Paris Conservatory
Speaker 2: because of her gender. Camille Saint Sans arranged for her
Speaker 2: to study with the renowned Belgian composer and organist Caesar
Speaker 2: franc saying of her, like children, women have no idea
Speaker 2: of obstacles, and their willpower breaks all barriers. Mademoiselle Holmes
Speaker 2: is a woman and extremist. Holmes published some of her
Speaker 2: early works under the male pseudonym Hermann Zenda Holmes. Many
Speaker 2: compositions include cantatas, symphonic poemes, operas, and over one hundred
Speaker 2: songs in a few works for solo piano, including this
Speaker 2: march Zoaves. The Zoaves are a class of French light
Speaker 2: infantry serving in France's North African colonies. Briefly, some uniforms
Speaker 2: of the Union Army in the American Civil War modeled
Speaker 2: upon them because of their lightweight. This piano march dates
Speaker 2: from eighteen sixty one, when the composer was but fourteen
Speaker 2: years old. Even though she was not permitted to study there.
Speaker 2: The manuscript is housed in the Library of Harris Conservatory
Speaker 2: and can be found on the International Music Score of
Speaker 2: Library Project. So here is a triumphal march on piano
Speaker 2: by Robert Tabona, composed by Augustus Mariette Holmes. Per engineer,
Speaker 2: our engineer, the mailman, mister Neil Richter. I'm your host,
Speaker 2: Frank Lobono, and we hope to have you join us
Speaker 2: on the next being. Frank, We're the only way to
Speaker 2: be is Frank. Thanks everybody.
Speaker 4: Of pass
Speaker 3: Mm HM, hudsondo, the radio dot com yah