srbishop asked: What is Survival's view on television coverage - and thereby contact - with indigenous groups? I ask because I recently read a 2009 article questioning the BBC's need to revisit Anuta for South Pacific, and for Alice Roberts to walk straight into a Nyangatom village in The Incredible Human Journey, despite sensitive and equally acceptable footage already existing from Bruce Parry's Tribe programme. There seemed to be no need for repeated exposure to television crews.
TV coverage can make millions of people aware of the problems facing tribal peoples, and sometimes lead directly to action to protect their lands and lives. Many TV programmes focusing on tribal peoples don’t even attempt to do this, of course, and some are downright harmful. Film crews can introduce diseases (such as when a TV research team allegedly introduced flu that killed four Matsigenka Indians in Peru), and the resulting programs can be racist, abusive or distorted (such as the program that eventually resulted from that research trip, which portrayed the Matsigenka quite falsely as sex-crazed, mean and savage).
Clearly, TV crews should not be seeking to make contact with isolated or uncontacted tribes at all. We’ve put together guidelines for broadcasters and production companies to use when filming with tribal peoples who do have regular contact with outsiders. When tribal people are treated with respect and the same standards of ethics that responsible broadcasters apply to minorities in industrialized countries, then they, the broadcasters and the viewing audiences can all benefit.
The nature of TV production means that repeat visits to the particular areas by the same or different crews are often necessary. Many tribal people welcome responsible journalism as it can draw attention to the problems they face and highlight the way their societies, like all others, are changing and developing. Providing the producers behave ethically, and that the tribespeople are appropriately compensated, the production process and the resulting coverage isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
