Documentary Shows Poor Working Conditions for Journalists in Ciudad Juarez Silvia Higuera - Journalism in the Americas
go to original October 2, 2017

Entre Batallas y Derrotas - Reportaje Especial (UACJ-TV)

When you think about the situation of journalists in Mexico, the first image that comes is one of violence. And for good reason. The country is considered the most dangerous in the American continent to practice this profession. In 2017 alone, at least 11 journalists have been recorded as killed for reasons related to their work.

However, in places like Ciudad Juárez in the state of Chihuahua, a journalist's vulnerability sometimes comes from the journalistic companies themselves and from colleagues who leave journalists to a kind of abandonment by not offering good salaries, minimum benefits of social security or support when they are directly targeted by violence.

This situation, which is well-known, but of which many prefer not to speak, is the topic of the documentary ‘Entre batallas y derrotas’ (Between battles and defeats), created and directed by Gustavo Cabullo Madrid, who has his Master’s degree in transborder journalism from the University of Texas at El Paso and is a television producer for the Autonomous University of Ciudad Juárez (UACJ for its acronym in Spanish).

"We [the journalists] played that double standard," Kabul said in a conversation with the Knight Center. "Denounce what happens outside, but we do not denounce what happens to us, inside, in our companies."

The documentary shows the battle that, parallel to their coverage of the femicides and the drug war, journalists face to "dignify their office, guarantee their physical, social security, salary, benefits, justice for fallen comrades and, not least, freedom of expression."

Read the interview with Gustavo Cabullo at Journalism in the Americas | Lea en Español

Related: Inter American Press Association Expresses Concern Over Journalist Murders (El Universal)

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