42 Comments

Thanks, all, for coming by today. I'll be holding more of these mini-workshops soon. Have a great day!

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This is a timely subject of the missing and murdered women - hi Ingrid. I have a few questions for Lauren, but I'm going to observe your workshop process for awhile.

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Nice to meet you!

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you too. Can I ask where you are looking? I know of the Canadian women, but I have read that similar things have happened in the U.S.

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This may be a stupid question, but do the indigenous communities have their own justice system? Are they required to submit birth and death certificates and take part in the census?

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Jermain Charlo is part of the work I'm connected to. As is Ashley Loring HeavyRunner from Blackfeet Country.

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My focus is primarily here in the US but with connections in Vancouver and Southern First Nations close to the US border.

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I live in the Detroit area which borders Ontario. It has been in our news non-stop about the residential school women. I wish you very good luck with your reporting.

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Thank you. With any luck the residential schools issue will get broader coverage. I'm not sure how useful that is but hopefully even a nugget of awareness will move it and it's connected histories will provide a catalyst for change.

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Those who read the local Detroit newspapers are aware. It has gotten a lot of coverage.

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Hi, I’d like to jump in queue. Aspiring journalist here

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Hi Terrell! Go for it.

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I’d like to write about competition among electric scooter companies in Southern California. I worked briefly for a contractor of one company and heard my colleagues say that our boss had used a stun gun against people living on the streets while in the course of retrieving scooters for business. Is that legal? Why is competition so fierce that this vigilanteism occurred?

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It sounds pretty clearly illegal unless he was defending his own life. Can you get police reports? You need to confirm this before anything.

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No, I don’t have any police reports. I doubt the police were called. I only overheard my colleagues talk about it as something our boss said he had done

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Yeah, people like to talk. So who knows. But you still have a story about fierce competition, if you can do some pre-reporting that shows it.

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Jumping in here. Would those colleagues go on the record to verify what they heard?

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Even if they do, it's a tricky area you're entering in to. I mean, if the guy admits it to the reporter, that's one thing. But when dealing with a private person, you're treading into defamation.

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Hi everyone! Thanks for joining me today. Feel free to ask whatever about how this process works, or tell me your ideas.

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I'm here as an observer. I'm not a journalist but am considering approaching a few in connection to something I've been working on. I feel like to do so it'd be helpful to understand the processes involved in taking nuggets of information and turning them into something more.

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Great. This is open to anyone interested in how to do that. What are you working on? Want to workshop it?

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I've been steeped in the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women phenomenon the past four years.

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Ah, wow. I've done some work on that as well. Are you working as an advocate? What are you wanting to get out that you don't see covered?

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The latter question is one I'm not entirely comfortable talking about publicly. How I've been working is in a rather unique capacity that pushes up against beliefs and has limited engagement. I'll say that I've been receiving information but not had the capacity to prove things that I know.

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So you are seeking a journalist who may be able to prove them?

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In your opinion, does the conviction and sentence of NXIVM's Saltzman predict any outcomes for Ghislane? Were you aware of NXIVM even existing when you got the email?

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I had never heard of NXIVM. I think it was three years before anyone knew who they were. As for Ghislane, your prediction is as good as mine...

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I’d be looking to investigate: how many women receive these sorts of emails. Presumably loads. STart a story from your experience then ask for more experiences. Or tell the story of one woman who was caught by them and use that as a hook to start looking at how many other set-ups like this there are. How many like Gislaine Maxwell? How do you find out W hat records and info come from the police? Friendly police officer? Or a ‘when your friend is t really your friend at all’ angle.

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It's a good idea. Questions: What is your pitch to your editor? This happens to women? See what I'm saying? What is the story? If it turns out to be high numbers of people contacted or people fishing, those are stories, but they'd both require a lot of investigation before your pitch.

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As for police records, some of them are public, and you can FOIA to request them.

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Pitch to Ed: Is this happening to women in your life? …

Making me think about how long the research would take before you had something definite enough. And if time is against you, has the story already moved on by the time you could get it out?

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Right. An editor isn't like to go for a story just posing a question. They want to know first if it's happening or not. That's the reveal...

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