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RANDALL BEACH: Amy Goodman keeps telling people they can make history in their community

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Amy Goodman, host of the "Democracy Now!" show speaks to the crowd at the United Church on the Green. Peter Casolino/New Haven Register
Amy Goodman, host of the "Democracy Now!" show speaks to the crowd at the United Church on the Green. Peter Casolino/New Haven Register

Activist journalist Amy Goodman sat in the basement of United Church on the Green Thursday night, receiving a long line of well-wishers, some of them starry-eyed at the chance to meet her.

"You've been a hero of mine for years," said a middle-aged man.

After she thanked him, he added, "It's easy to get discouraged."

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"Oh, you mustn't get discouraged," she told him.

Hope is a key theme for Goodman in her life and job, but she always backs it up with perseverance and hard work.

Goodman, who hosts the news hour "Democracy Now!," noted during her talk at the church that when the program began in 1996, it could be heard on only on a couple dozen community radio stations. Now it's available on more than 1,000 public radio and TV stations (locally on Citizens Television, Comcast Channel 26).

Watching Goodman anchor that show, it's striking to contrast her appearance with anchors on commercial TV. Goodman, 55, has straight gray hair and no visible make-up.

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She avoids flashy outfits on TV and during public appearances. When she came to the church to accept the 2012 Gandhi Peace Award from the New Haven-based group Promoting Enduring Peace, she wore brown boots, brown pants and a brown jacket.

Goodman described "Democracy Now!" as being about "voices of the grass roots. That's the power of independent media: Allowing people to speak for themselves. We need an independent media, especially in this election year."

Turning her sights on the "pundits" of commercial TV, Goodman remarked, "They know so little about so much. And they're explaining the world to you! You deserve so much better than that."

She said part of her show's mission is to "weave together different stations in a patchwork quilt, each one reflecting the community."

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Goodman talks about community-mindedness a lot. When I spoke with her at the church, I asked where she gets her drive and political passion; community service was part of her response.

"I've always been deeply concerned about what's happening in the world," she said. "I was heavily influenced by my grandparents and my parents."

"My mom and dad were peace activists," she noted. "My mother was a teacher and a social worker. My father was a doctor."

"They were very civic-minded, involved with their communities," she said of her parents, who raised her on Long Island. "That's what all of us should be doing. That's what makes democracy vibrant."

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Goodman received a degree in anthropology from Harvard in 1984 and was contemplating studying biochemistry when she discovered the independent radio station WBAI in New York City.

"It was just raw," she recounted later. "It was all the beauty and horror that is New York in all its myriad accents."

She landed a job at the station and spent 10 years there as the producer of its evening news show. This led to her position with "Democracy Now!"

Believing the role of a reporter is "to go where the silence is and say something," Goodman traveled to East Timor in 1991 to cover protests of human rights violations. She was nearly killed during a massacre of about 300 Timorese people.

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In her speech Thursday, she said, "Our job is to pull that curtain back to show the reality of war. Can you imagine if, for one week, people were showed the real impact of war? What if it were above the fold of every morning newspaper, on the top of every TV broadcast, all the images of children and women being blown apart? Americans would say, 'No. War is not the answer in the 21st century.'"

Later, I asked her about President Barack Obama and his handling of war issues. She recalled he was elected after campaigning on a promise to end the war in Iraq. Although our troops were pulled out of there, she noted, "we're still involved in the longest war in (U.S.) history, in Afghanistan. And that's Obama's war."

Goodman said "the challenge of 2012" is for people to realize a political movement can be created that is more powerful than the occupant of the White House.

"Stand up for what you believe in," she told the audience in that church. This, she said, is the way to "make the world a better place."

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"If you're involved in social change," she said, "you can help determine history."

She closed her speech by saying: "We must always remember these words: We will not be silent."

Contact Randall Beach at rbeach@nhregister.com or 203-789-5766.

Randall Beach a freelance columnist for Connecticut Magazine. He was formerly a columnist and reporter for the New Haven Register.