What Not To Do

Graphic material entailed.

What not to do or how to when speaking with natives of any culture especially those known for violence, There was everything wrong with this scenario from the get go. 1. Don’t put yourself in that position to begin with. 2. Know who, what you’re dealing with and how to go about it. 3. Nothing is going to piss off a tribal member more than shoving a camera in their face — back to know what you’re getting into. Always prepare yourself for it, if you can not do that then don’t walk into it. 4. Never show fear/discomfort because it translates as weakness in many tribal societies. It’s a tribalistic warrior culture they’ll eat you alive if you show fear or discomfort literally in this case.

In this scenario the guru was already agitated so it wasn’t a good idea to start with. Along with the cameras and basically the guru not wanting them there what I got from it as far as possibly his perspective was “Okay you’re a weak you won’t look me in eye even. You didn’t lay out any boundaries so I’m going to shock value you. You want a show I’ll give you a show. Now get off my territory and stop exploiting me” more or less. I’m not saying that’s what the network was trying to do I’m saying from possibly the perspective of the individual they were speaking with. It’s a fine line in media but I do think the interview was poorly handled by the crew. When the journalist wanted to leave they should have let him leave. There should’ve been some guidelines ahead of time by the network of “No he will not eat human flesh or drink alcohol he’s a Muslim. If you can’t agree to that then no interview.”

This on the other hand is a great example of how to conduct such an interview.

Completely different atmosphere altogether.