Citizen Journalism: A New and Powerful Tool in the Health Care Reform Debate

Check out the newest project - an exciting citizen journalism project - to come out of The Media Consortium, a coalition of progressive, journalism organizations! RH Reality Check is so proud to be a partner in this project along with GritTV, The Uptake, Color Lines, and Feministing! It's called MyRapidReporting.com and it's all about you.

Here's the deal:

You have a story to tell about your own experiences with health care coverage, right? But is it being told? Every day we're reading and listening to the "same voices of pundits and politicians repeated on the morning and evening news" but where is your story in all of this?

This is your chance to document your own story, the story of your friends and/or family or the stories in your own community. The Media Consortium has created a brand new video portal that collects the personal video stories we're not hearing/seeing in the public discourse on health care reform and shares them with journalists, writers, politicians - everyone!

Here's a brief rundown about how it works and how you can easily (very easily!) participate and share with everyone you know!

It's easy to become an RH Reality Check citizen journalist. We've broken this down into three simple options. You can do one or all!

1) Videotape the proceedings of a health care town hall - try to interview speakers or other attendees.

2) Conduct interviews around your community (with a reproductive health care provider, for instance?) and gather personal reproductive and sexual healthcare stories. We've even provided some helpful starting questions for you.

3) Tell your own personal reproductive healthcare story. (Ideas on how to structure your personal story are here).

Upload your captured video by going to MyRapidReport.com and click UPLOAD VIDEO. It's just that simple.

So what will happen with your stories? Like YouTube, they will be open for the public to view. But you will also have a captured audience of reporters, editors, organizers and more who will be combing over these stories during the next month. Your videos will help identify the needs and hopes of everyday citizens around the future of our healthcare as they continue to monitor, report and organize around this critical issue. RH Reality Check will feature the videos in our TV Reality section on our homepage, in our reporting - in individual articles and posts - when it's appropriate, and hope to be able to use them in any advocacy campaigns focused on how critical reproductive and sexual health care discussions are in the broader health care reform discussion.

By the way, if you happen to live in New York City, GRITtv has
generously offered their studio space for you to come in and tape your
own personal story starting on Sep. 11 and every Friday afterward. 
Email gritv@grittv.org to get more information and reserve your time to tell your healthcare story!

And one last note, starting on September 1, Lindsay Beyerstein, The Media Consortium's own health care blogger, featured weekly on RH Reality Check, will start doing daily posts on the most current debates and round-up of reporting around health care for the next month. You can check out the Daily Pulse on this site regularly or here.

Finally, feel free to spread the word about this opportunity to your family, friends, neighbors, and local community groups. If you're on Twitter, you can use the #mrrhealth hashtag!