For the last 15 years, the International Women’s Media Foundation has been providing safety training for journalists in places like the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic, Mexico and Colombia.
With a contentious and polarizing election year unfolding domestically, the foundation recognized a growing need for safety training for U.S. journalists.
“We decided that it was really urgently needed, and we needed to do a new safety tour across America, focusing on swing states, but also conducting safety training in other states,” says Elisa Lees Munoz, IWMF’s executive director.
But it’s not just political journalists whose safety is at risk.
“Covering women’s health has led to threats and attacks against women and other journalists, who are covering reproductive rights,” Munoz says. “The environmental beat is polarizing and very dangerous in some countries. So unfortunately, we can’t rely any longer on former notions of what creates a dangerous environment or a hostile environment for journalists. We really have to be prepared for threats and attacks and hostility against journalists everywhere they are reporting you.”
More information about the International Women’s Media Foundation, including safety resources for journalists is available on the foundation’s website.
Munoz admitted that the media landscape is vastly different since the foundation was started 35 years ago.
“The journalism world has evolved dramatically since that time, as has the organization,” she says. “We started as an organization that was dedicated to supporting women in the news media to reach equality, mostly in employment status, beats that they were reporting, salaries, opportunities, etc. While we still heavily focus on that, what we have learned in these 35 years is that you can’t have equity unless you’re advocating for everybody to achieve equity.”
The foundation advocates for diverse voices in news media and those that are underrepresented in countries across the globe.
“We have come to realize that one of the main reasons why women and non binary journalists and journalists of color are not entering the journalism field or leaving the journalism field is due to safety concerns,” Munoz says. “We felt that in order to support equity in the news media, we really had to make safety a central component of our work.”
Elisa Lees Muñoz, executive director of the International Women’s Media Foundation discusses a series of training sessions the foundation is offering for journalists covering political conventions and other news events.
