A Pulitzer Prize winner for international reporting came to San Francisco State University Tuesday to speak with students of journalism about his experience in the field.
Steve Fainaru is a Washington Post foreign correspondent most widely known for covering the lawless operations of private security contractors in the war in Iraq. His book on his experience there from 2004-2007 is “Big Boy Rules”. Fainaru is also the coauthor of “The Duke of Havana: Baseball, Cuba, and the Search for the American Dream”.
Fainaru claims to have initially been drawn to journalism because, “it seemed like a really cool job that offered you experience and passage to adventures”.
Graduating from the University of Missouri, Fainaru started his career at the San Jose Mercury News but soon found himself back in school getting another degree in international affairs with hopes to become a foreign correspondent.
Fainaru has worked for the Washington Post since 2000, previously covering civil liberties and the fight against terrorism and serving as an investigative reporter focusing on sports.
Before writing for the Post, Fainaru worked at The Boston Globe for 11 years, covering the Boston Red Sox, Wall Street and Latin America.
In front of an eager group of green student journalists, Fainaru discussed his experiences covering the war in Iraq and the implications of the decrease in coverage of how America conducts its war strategies and business abroad.
“I felt like I discovered this whole other side of the war,” said Fainaru. “Story coverage was in real time there. You felt like you were at the center of history at that moment”.
These days, Fainaru thinks more of his family and is more interested in hyper-local news coverage that benefits a community but still covers the Mexican drug wars to which he says is like, “a picnic” in comparison to Iraq.
Fainaru ended his speech, leaving students with a solemn but illuminating view on the future of journalism.
