Reply #100: Support for Beth and SAVE

[bethsupporter]

I am Beth Lowry's husband, and I am so proud of her and all she has done to help others. When the interviews with Aila Ibn Kareem first aired on two of the local TV stations, Beth was very hurt. A few years ago, my cousin worked as a researcher for Bob Woodward at the Washington Post. From my discussions with him, they still have pretty strict requirements on verifying a story before it gets printed. I think that local TV news has a much lower standard. They are under pressure to get a story out and don’t always have the leadership or discipline to verify the details or get the whole story. Since Beth was prevented from talking about the case because of her confidentially agreement (and the advice of her board and attorney), she was left wide open to attack without the opportunity to tell her story. What would our news be like if it only included one side of the story? (Every watched any Al-Jazeera?) In cases where people are prevented from defending themselves, I think our news reporters have a special obligation to dig a little deeper to uncover the truth. Since SAVE gets most of its support from individuals and grant review boards in the local community, bad press can severely limit or destroy SAVE’s ability to help others. There is only so much financial support available in a community and the competition in Nashville is fierce. If an individual or grant board has a doubt about an agency they can just move on to the next applicant, and they will in a heartbeat. If Aila Ibn Kareem had called the news media and said “Help, I’m being evicted because I can’t follow the rules”, I don’t think we would be having this discussion. I can’t believe the local news media want to hurt community support programs like SAVE. But in not being diligent in their reporting responsibility and putting too much emphasis on ratings and not enough emphasis on uncovering the truth, a news agency can become a powerful weapon that can be manipulated. We see this often in politics, but at least there a politician can defend themselves.

After reading the different opinions in this forum and some of the e-mails that Beth has received, we both have a better understanding of how some people try hard to understand the world and events while others try to mold the events to fit their views. I thank those of you who have defended Beth or who have just held out for the truth before passing judgment. For the rest of you, I read what you have written and I discount it. Isn’t the free discussion of ideas great?!

Britt