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Hello everyone. Maybe you can help me with my dilemma. It's about dealing with sources, with an unusal twist. :)
I’m a reporter in a very Catholic country and I’ve been covering, for about a month now, the religious sector, which means that I get to talk to bishops and archbishops most of the time. Recently, one of the editors told me to kiss the hand (or at least bow and touch their hand to my forehead) of the bishop/archbishop when I meet/interview him as “it is part of the culture.” It will also make them remember me, he said.
I told him that I usually just shake their hand when I meet them for the first time and I find the whole deferential gesture uncomfortable. For one, it’s not a hard and fast cultural rule. Only devout people do that. Also, I’m an atheist. Lastly and more importantly, I feel like I’m ingratiating myself to these bishops if I do the whole hand-kissing thing. I don’t want to treat the bishops with the deference of the devout. Sure, I respect them and their opinions, but I want treat them the same way as I treated everybody else – always with a bit of a distance. There is also the fact that the hand-kissing underlines their authority and if I do that, I’m afraid that it will say that we are not on an equal footing and that I, as a part of their flock, better defer to their judgment at the end of the day. Also, I’d like to think that my professionalism and my questions and my work will make my sources remember me. Or am I asking too much? Anyway, The Boss and I did not exactly resolve anything. I told him I’ll think about it. He said hand shakes could be awkward for the bishops and I should not fear that being deferential would be in conflict with my work as a reporter. If the deference shows in my work, then I should be worried, he said. I understand his point that one needs to go an extra mile when doing a story and that it’s necessary to connect with the sources. Maybe I’m overreacting. Maybe there’s another way to connect. But, really, hand-kissing?
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