This excerpt recounts the author’s perspective on the profession of journalism, emphasizing that reporters should possess a social conscience, a broad knowledge base, and perseverance. The author also shares their reflections at age 50, including maintaining curiosity, achieving balance between material and spiritual pursuits, and contemplating the future.
Video Transcript
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Transcript
The best journalist is first, having a social conscience; second, possessing knowledge; and third, being able to run long distances. I couldn’t handle running 100 meters – I ran it. I believe these three things combined, people expect the safety concerns surrounding vaccines to be completely resolved, just like with the melamine scandal. We always move forward in a logic loop of problems arising, solving problems, and completely resolving them. Otherwise, what is there for a journalist to do?
Transcript
I believe the best journalist first has a social conscience, second has knowledge reserves, and third can run long distances – I’ve outrun the 100 meters, so it’s no problem. I think these three things combined, at 50 years old, you’ll understand that I seem to be well-suited for journalism. I’m naturally intertwined with China’s 40 years of reform, and on my 30th birthday, standing by the banks of the Songhua River, when I was 40, my birthday coincided with the 2008 Olympics, and I came out of the Olympic broadcast in which I went in. At 50 this year, as China commemorates 40 years of reform and opening up, there’s certainly a corresponding connection – whether the “Great Era” is at forty or China’s reform is at fifty-five?
I believe that after walking through 40 years of road, China has already given people enough in terms of material things, and to the country enough. However, anxiety and confusion have increased, not decreased. We thought we were strong and wealthy, so everything was OK, but we discovered that material wealth is just a foundation; it’s difficult to become spiritually rich and truly a great power. The United States is already attacking your high-tech, we need to attack agricultural products. There’s always been a saying in the world: “It’s hard for second place to be achieved!” How many Second Place countries has America fixed? Therefore, we must go through a long period of time to transform “not one” into surpassing ourselves. I can’t get everything.
I was fortunate that I started doing television at 25, first from figure interviews, and I contacted hundreds or thousands of figures with various halos. At that time, young people thought that these halos must make them very happy, but when they got closer, they found no, the halos have little to do with their happiness, and sometimes they are inversely proportional. Recently, I just finished reading about Guo Moruo’s last 29 years – Guo Moruo barely escaped persecution, serving as Deputy Minister of State Council, Vice Chairman of CPPCC, Vice Chairwoman of National People’s Congress, etc. But his two sons committed suicide, and the other may have been thrown to death from a building? Would he be happy?
What do you use to measure happiness? When you are in your sixties, two of your sons leave you in a few years; even if you’re a Deputy Minister, can you be happy? Many famous paintings can make people happy, and spending many years safely is enough to make you happy. What do you want? So I think looking at people is the best mirror. To say something more important, I think much of our anxiety now comes from thinking too much and reading too little books. This is Yang Geng’s reply to a young person – if you don’t read books, you rely on fast food; you pick up a mobile phone and plan to find a miracle pill. How can that be? I learned cleverness through the slow process of more and more books; subtraction comes from reading more books.
Therefore, I don’t expect everyone to achieve it, but I hope the proportion increases – more and more Chinese people can read themselves better in books, which is the most important thing. No one sits on the ground and looks up at the stars, trying to figure out everything. I can’t do that. But I can look in a mirror. A few years ago, when a BBC news anchor came to Beijing, claiming to be the “most awesome” news anchor in BBC, he had someone organize a dialogue between him and a Chinese news anchor; we talked. That guy asked me during the conversation, “What do you think BBC should learn from CCTV?” I first made a joke and said, of course, they should first learn Chinese.
Next, after making a joke, I said, “I think BBC most needs to learn from CCTV is their curiosity about this world.” We’ve been observing the world with great curiosity these years as we quickly reach out to the world; we have more than 70 correspondents now, and we feel that when a student sees something new in foreign countries, he feels very curious. We carry a huge sense of curiosity and observe the world, while BBC has already considered Britain itself as the world. You don’t need to be curious anymore. The brother slapped the table and said, “What we lack is this thing.” In 2007, when I interviewed a Japanese writer, he told me, “Japan’s country besides lacking hope, has everything else.” Later I realized that this sentence was really deep; from another angle, ten years ago, I thought China Okay, here’s the English translation of the provided text:
“To be honest, I’m very worried that China will one day end up on the downside – feeling truly impoverished even when everything is available. I fear that by the time I’m 50, I’ll become a person who, despite having all material comforts, is incredibly poor. The problem in our reality is that there are many highly educated people with no culture, and many impoverished individuals with countless numbers on their bank accounts. That’s really what’s wrong with this era. True poverty isn’t frightening because there’s a forward direction and hope. This is why I say that a lack of morality and human failings are the root cause. Therefore, I believe scientists invented so much not because they initially carried great missions, but out of curiosity.
I want to be able to figure it out myself. So I’ve always encouraged myself to be curious, especially around 50 years old. That’s why I’m happy now. One thing that bothers me is persistence – as you were saying you’re still persisting. I said don’t say that persistence leads to death. In the past, we used to say ‘persistence equals success,’ and ‘China football will persevere even during the black minutes,’ or ‘persevere,’ but it loses its fun and method, so we rely on perseverance. Sometimes persistence is important, but often it has an opposite side. I’m afraid that when I do something, like chatting with people, I’ll persist in finishing what I started – which is now too late for my time, but I’m curious to see how these conversations will turn out.
I give myself a small keyword and engage in conversation with others. At 50 years old, as long as you can still maintain a great deal of curiosity, there’s no problem. I like all fun things, but not necessarily the most popular things today. Trendy terms change quickly – do you remember some of them? Will a media outlet on the internet 10 years from now become a traditional media outlet? So fun things always have their own intrinsic appeal. I respect everyone’s preferences; there must be a reason behind it, but when viewed over the long term, we see that Chinese people most enjoy playing mahjong. If you also like eating fast food, then restaurants serving large meals will naturally decline.
Many things aren’t just about expressing an emotion and moving on. How much fragmented reading do you get from your daily mobile phone use? How much longer-form reading do you have? But this is also a process – the mobile phone is becoming our handcuffs. So, seeing shorter content more often leads to short-sightedness. However, I don’t worry about ‘content is king.’ It will always return. You won’t keep entertaining yourself until your 40s, like I see teenagers drinking soda and telling them to drink less, but you know they will still drink it. On the other hand, I’m optimistic – he’ll eventually return to a tea-drinking lifestyle. This is the life of a Chinese person.
It’s normal, but I hope the transformation will happen faster. We just express an emotion, and there are fewer investigative reporters now. You don’t read investigations. Thank you everyone.”