“Media is just interested in covering conflict and blood”


Reframed Stories asks people to respond to dominant themes in news coverage about themselves and the issues that affect them. The stories center on the reflections of persons who are more often represented by others than by themselves in media.

José Santi is one of the people in charge of Sarayaku’s blog, Sarayaku: El Pueblo del Medio Día.

Parece ser que los medios no siempre han cubierto todos los temas que son importantes para los grupos indígenas en el Ecuador.

En Sarayaku estamos esforzándonos y trabajando bastante en la propuesta del Kawsak Sacha, nuestra alternativa de vida que invita a la coexistencia pacífica con uno mismo y con todos los seres vivos.

I see that media do not seem to be covering all the topics that are important for indigenous groups in Ecuador.

In Sarayaku, we are devoting a lot of effort to the promotion of the Kawsay Sacha, our proposal for a way of life that invites to a peaceful coexistence with the environment, with one self and with others.

Dominant words from 240 articles mentioning “sarayaku” and “territory” between April 2013 and June 2017 found within four Media Cloud collections of Ecuador’s Spanish-language media outlets. (View original query; View larger image)

El Kawsay Sacha también habla sobre temas como la educación, formas de organizacion, espiritualidad, la salud, y la conservación del medio ambiente; otra vez, ninguno de estos temas aparece aquí. Nosotros tratamos de promover nuestras luchas de manera integral y metas en nuestro propio blog y a través de las redes sociales, pero los medios masivos no cubren eso.

A los medios solo les interesa el conflicto y la sangre, pero no toman en cuenta otros temas que también son importantes para nosotros.

También noto que en la imagen solo aparecen los nombres de los líderes políticos, pero hay mucha otra gente que también está contribuyendo mucho desde otros espacios, y es importante que a ellos también se les escuche. Por eso nosotros nos hemos esforzado mucho en crear nuestros propios medios y queremos seguir colaborando con distintos medios y grupos nacionales e internacionales que estén interesados en trabajar en conjunto.

Necesitamos encontrar todos los espacios que se pueda para compartir nuestra lucha y nuestras experiencias con el resto del mundo.

Kawsay Sacha also talks about topics such as education, ways of organization, spirituality, health, and land conservation, again, none of which appear here. We try to promote our issues and goals through our website and social media, but mainstream media does not cover this.

Media is just interested in covering struggles, conflict, and blood, and it does not care about other topics that are also important to us.

I also notice that I only find the names of political leaders here, but there are more people than these who are contributing. That is why in Sarayaku we have put a lot of effort in creating our own mediums of communication, and that is also why we want to keep collaborating with other national and international media and organizations interested in working together.

We need to find as much space as possible to share our struggles and experiences with the world.

Sarayaku delegation. Photo credit: José Santi.

Comparto esto para representar nuestras alternativas de vida y nuestra existecia como pueblos indígenas amazónicos. Este es un esfuerzo por reinvindicar las luchas emprendidas frente a los proyectos extractivos, los cuales sólo traen problemas, contaminación, extinción, destrucción y muerte a los pueblos. El Pueblo Kichwa de Sarayaku ha desarrollado una serie de acciones y acuerdos estratégicos con miembros de distintas organizaciones indígenas de la región para promover una lucha en unidad como pueblos y nacionalidades, e invitamos a los medios nacionales e internacionales a convertirse en aliados estratégicos para que las aspiraciones de los pueblos sean difundidas de manera integral y efectiva a nivel de la sociedad.

I share this to represent the alternatives of life and the existence of the indigenous peoples living in the Ecuadorian Amazon region. This is an effort to defend our fight against extraction projects in our territories, which only bring problems, contamination, extinction, destruction, and death to communities. The Sarayaku people has put into practice a series of actions and strategic agreements with members of different indigenous organizations from the region to support a struggle for change in which different communities and nationalities work together, and we invite national and international media to become strategic allies to help reach and share the aspirations of indigenous peoples in an integral and effective manner among other social sectors.

This is part of a series developed in close collaboration with the indigenous community of Sarayaku and the Shuar nationality, both situated in the Ecuadorian Amazon region. The Sarayaku and Shuar people have held long fights at a national and international level to stop extraction projects in their territories, and public messaging has been an important part of this struggle. We asked members to respond to some preliminary media analysis that suggests how topics related to their communities are represented in news.

This post was proofread by Belen Febres-Cordero.

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