Journalism is propaganda. So-called “fact-checking” is double-speak. The press is the enemy of the people. Nayib Bukele has summed up this sentiment on Elon Musk’s X: “You don’t hate the media enough.”
Last year, as El Salvador was sending Venezuelan and Salvadoran sports to the Terrorist Confinement Center (CECOT), a colleague at a prominent US media outlet asked me if El Faro does journalism “straight down the middle” in El Salvador.
How can independent journalism stand for anything if we’re hogtied to a mean that autocrats are constantly pulling in their own direction? What good is a ‘fourth estate’ if there is no accountability to be had – if the powerful would snuff out your very ability to publish? Why defend the press as a de-facto branch of power, rather than as a promoter of the public interest?
In the last thirteen months, since we launched the first issue of our digital magazine, dozens of journalists have fled El Salvador to avoid imprisonment, while legacy outlets capitulate to government pressure. El Salvador is entering yet another chapter of mass graves, of state secrecy, of a muzzled press. El Faro continues to illuminate El Salvador, and the dictatorship ruling it, from exile. Where’s the median if you can’t go home?
Instead of seeking middle ground in quicksand, this issue of Beacon —El Faro English’s newly renamed digital magazine—applies the journalistic method: We contrast fact with the official, authorized narrative. We verify the accounts of both murderer and victim, of the detestable and the noble. We uncover the facts so that others can understand them, and hopefully act on them. We fiercely defend the public’s right to know.
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This issue is varied in genre and geography. You’ll find an investigation in El Salvador, a Guatemalan interview, and a chronicle from Louisiana. We’ve translated El Faro’s first-ever long-form narrative chronicle from 2001, which takes us to the Balkans after genocide. We end with a fictional tale of a Salvadoran detention center on Mars and a poem from a Nicaraguan exile. The cover photo is by Fred Ramos, from El Faro’s 2013 special: The room of bones.
The next issue of Beacon is due in December. El Faro English strives not only to translate Central America, but to see the world from a Central American lens.
Our deep gratitude to Gioconda Belli and Ruben Reyes Jr. for graciously sharing their luminous, urgent work. Thank you to Max Granger, our stellar translator, whose care helped this issue come to life, and to Alba Hawkins for her gorgeous interpretation of Belli. Above all, thank you to our readers. Your support helps us shine a brighter beacon on Central America.
