The panel on Afghanistan, included morethan Phyllis Bennis. There were also three women (two Canadian and
one American) from Afghans for Peace.
They had found each other through
Facebook and shared a frustration at NATO policy toward Afghanistan
and wanted to deepen their connection and support for the country.
One of the issues they discussed was
not having a media outlet to tell the news from an Afghan point of
view. When I talked to them afterward, they also noted that
communicating amongst the Afghan diaspora was challenging too.
I proposed using Kickstarter (Wikipedia) to raise
money to create a website (media outlet) for members of the diaspora
to discuss matters, a blog community. The expectation is that once
the website established itself as a community, it could then also
become a central point for publishing original news and analysis.
This would be a news outlet and also be a way of avoiding the biases
and spin added by corporate news outlets.
Samira was not familiar with
Kickstarter. Kickstarter is a fundraising tool that allows money to
be raised from donors around the world. It relies on the project
organizers to tap into their personal networks, but it also makes it
possible to reach beyond the inner circle.
I would probably write a budget for six
months of funding to create the website and pay someone to manage it.
Once the site is ready to do original journalism, it should create a
second Kickstarter fundraiser and hire one or more people to report
on Afghanistan.
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