Nieman’s 80th Anniversary Reunion Weekend

Thank you. It’s great to be here. In the early ’70s, I would never thought of getting a job in the U.S. mainstream media.

I was a new immigrant. I applied and took my first job as a reporter at a Chinese-language daily in New York. I arrived in Chinatown at a time of a weakening in the community, as residents demonstrated against police brutality, and demanded equal job opportunities. I was excited to be there.

I was also proud to become the first English-speaking reporter in Chinatown. While other papers were writing about social events, I began covering courts and City Hall and pursuing stories about slumlords and sweatshops.

In the process, I pissed off some pretty powerful people in the community. What’s new? To the point where I got a call in the newsroom, “Watch out when you walk on the street. We know how to find you.”

It could be someone from the Ghost Shadows, the Flying Dragons, or the White Tigers: the youth gangs in Chinatown that were backed by the powerful family associations. Despite the dramatic warning, I kept doing what I was doing. I had to.

Later, when working at another paper, the owner told me someone had just offered him $30,000 of advertising money to fire me. “I’m not going to do that,” he said. “But Ying, do me a favor, will you stay away from Chinatown?” Once again, I didn’t stay away and weeks later I was fired.

Getting fired turned out to be the best thing that happened to me. It forced me to challenge myself, and I started pitching stories to the English media. I even got a job at the New York Daily News as the first Chinese immigrant reporter.

Thank you.

For my first assignment, I was sent to China to investigate the smuggling of people to the United States. It was a booming business. Many borrowed huge sums to pay for the passage and ended up working as virtual indentured slaves in sweatshops, kitchens, massage parlors.

I went with another reporter, Jim Dow, to Hong Kong, China, and Bangkok and spent three months on the project. We tracked down smugglers, known as snakeheads for the ability to sneak underground.

Our investigation produced the world’s first extensive report on the smuggling of human beings from China. As a result of this story, I was hired full-time at the Daily News.

Three years later, New York City woke up on a June day to the shocking news that the Golden Venture, a freighter, had ran aground off its harbor with 300 men and women from China hidden on board. Ten drowned.

I soon learned that a certain “Sister Ping” was the mastermind behind the ship who, over the years, have smuggled hundreds of Chinese peasants and laborers into the United States. I put her picture in the story in the paper.

The phone rang. A source was to [inaudible 04:18] me off. “Ying, she has a contract on you for $30,000. A lot of young men want to do the job. They are hungry.” The Daily News editors had my back. They reported the threat to authorities and hired two bodyguards to cover me twenty-four hours a day.

It was no fun dealing with gangster, slumlords, and human traffickers. Then, I even get into more trouble when a top official in Taiwan slapped me with a criminal libel suit that could lead to two years in jail and a fine of twenty million dollars, as if I got that kind of money.

With the help of a team of lawyers and the support of leading media organizations in the U.S., Hong Kong, and Taiwan, we got the court to say, “Not guilty.” The victory made legal history in Taiwan.

The libel suit reconnected me to Asia. In the ’90s, U.S. journalism was facing mounting challenges, but Chinese journalists faced worse. In response, my alma mater, the University of Hong Kong, wanted to set up a journalism program.

Over a chance cup of coffee, the provost asked, “Do you have any idea of what to do?” It was a no-brainer. We need to train aspiring journalists who have the skills and knowledge to practice with the highest professional status. We also need to promote best practices within the industry.

I soon moved back to Hong Kong, reconnected with my roots, and created a boutique journalism school at the university. I put together an international faculty of top-notch journalists and educators.

Over the next 20 years, we would graduate hundreds of students from Hong Kong, mainland China, and countries from around the world. We took on other missions. We documented the challenges facing Chinese journalists. Our aim was the same.

Strive for the highest endings, respect for facts, speaking truth to power. We published books by Chinese journalists whose writings were banned in China, sharing their voices with the outside world. Yes, there’s investigative reporting in China.

I’m most proud of the young people we nurtured and the work they have done. Many have to cope with the most difficult conditions and circumstances. As a journalist, I was one voice. As a teacher, I have helped give birth to many voices.

Swe Win, writer, editor, and former political prisoner in Myanmar, is now fighting a criminal libel suit. Joyce Zhou, producer for BBC in Beijing, who has been roughed up too many times by government agents.

Furthermore, my students have added diversity to newsrooms in the U.S. and around the world. Fion Li, the first Hong Kong native to serve as bureau chief of Bloomberg in Hong Kong—it is the third largest Bloomberg bureau in the world.

Jun Wan Pac, a brave young reporter who fought #MeToo abuses at the largest media company in Singapore. Despite her courage, she ended up losing her job, but is now freelancing.

There are many more. These are only a few of my many students. They are among the best of a new generation of journalists who are skilled, passionate and dedicated. They are the best reasons for me to keep going at age seventy-one.

I saw in them how my life has come full circle. As a young person, I came to the United States and became a reporter. I am grateful to have learned from the best. The legendary writers, columnists, editors—too many to name. Many of them are here with us tonight.

I was able to take my learning spec to Hong Kong and Asia to share with the people who face daily dangers for practicing journalism. Threats, physical attacks and even murder.

Who knows, with a current assault on the free press in America, journalists here would have much more to learn from the Asian counterparts who have been dealing with fake news and censorships for generations.

Globally, information is being weaponized to misinform and attack. The powers that be are targeting journalists, making journalism a crime. We’ll have to redouble our efforts. We have to work together, pooling intelligence and know-how across communities, cultures and nations to uncover the stories that are crying out to be told.

Thank you for listening to my stories. Thank you very much.