Dangerous Profession?

When people think of journalists, usually the image of someone standing outside of the town hall with a notebook and pencil comes to mind - a fairly safe profession. However, global journalism is far from safe. In today's times with countries fighting and harboring animosity towards one another, and a journalist's connection to the mass media, journalists have become targets.

Recently the unstable Zimbabwean government seized four journalists in an effort to quash opposing party surges. The American Society for Newspaper Editors had an online story in 2002  about journalists being killed in countries across the globe from Afghanistan to Columbia and Algeria. And we can't forget Jill Carroll, the journalist who, in 2006, was held hostage in Iraq for 82 days by Sunni Muslim insurgents.

It boils down to journalism being as dangerous as you make it, and the one rule that applies to everything in life, also applies to journalism: Be Careful.