Laura – Beach Haven
“The last message I sent was to my friend saying that my phone was dying. We’re just grabbing coffee, because I need coffee on a daily basis; multiple times a day.
I was born in Taupō, then moved to Canada, then back to New Zealand. I mean Auckland is my home. I’ve been here the last six years. It’s a lot different to Canada. In Canada I would get harassed on the street almost on a daily basis. New Zealand’s a bit of a change for me. I don’t think it’s vocal sexism, but it’s very clearly there because I’m wanting to get into journalism. Lots and lots of women aren’t able to really get into that profession easily. And it’s a dying profession in the first place.
Kind of an uphill battle with that one. I’ve got a passion for it. It’s like you find a story, and it’s something that no-one knows about, and you just kind of want to let people know it, and you want to provide that information to people. Like at the moment I’m doing a really interesting story about Ketamine as a use – treating depression, like drug resistant depression. There are trials going on at Auckland Uni and it wasn’t advertised on the flyer. So now I’m getting to divulge that information to the uni students, which is really interesting.
I think providing the information just allows people to navigate their lives better. People can either support Ketamine or go against Ketamine. I did something just awhile ago on prisons; about, well basically how horribly prisoners are treated, and do we get behind that – what do we do as citizens? It’s mobilising people basically. It’s about journalists, and their role is to be the most accurate source of information, and to be the most trusted source of information, and that’s where the fake news dilemma is really dangerous. If people can’t trust their journalist then they don’t know what information is true in the first place, and you can’t trust the internet. So, I mean at the end of the day, who do you trust?
People just need to be more involved in their communities, and the technological age is making that a lot harder. It’s easier to stare down at your phone and not look up at the world than actually try and put yourself out there and interact with people. I think that’s where a lot of anxiety comes in from my generation. It’s hard to interact with other people, because there’s easier options. It’s distraction. Technology is a distraction and you can spend hours and hours just staring at your phone or staring at your screen instead of being in the world and seeing people.”
