The life and career of journalist Lara Logan is a compelling story in and of itself, but the journalist finds telling other people’s stories is what matters most to her.
“I want to know the truth,” Logan said. “I don’t want to be the foreign correspondent that knows everything because I don’t.”
CBS News’ chief foreign correspondent for “60 Minutes,” Logan was the featured speaker of the Florida Forum Series on Oct. 17 at the Times-Union Center for Performing Arts.
Logan was born in 1971 in South Africa during Apartheid and recounted stories growing up under the system of racial segregation.
“It was a very powerful moment to be born,” she said. “It defined so much of my principles and the beliefs that I follow, and the example set by the people I learned from.”
She recalled starting out her journalism career during the end of Apartheid, the concern of what could have followed and the magnitude and impact of former South African President Nelson Mandela’s steady influence as an activist and as South Africa’s first black head of state.
“Mandela never lost a moment to be human and to be a leader,” Logan said. “He was just an extraordinary man.”
Logan’s career has also placed her in numerous dangerous situations, from being embedded with soldiers during Operation Iraqi Freedom, to living with the Iraqi people during the war and embedding with Afghan soldiers during the war in Afghanistan. Logan discussed how getting to know the Iraqi people and the Afghan people who were fighting the Taliban helped to shape her world view.
“If you don’t begin to understand how they view your presence there, how do you begin to understand what the strategy should be?” Logan said.
She also noted the difficulties she’s faced being a woman in working as a foreign correspondent and in dangerous areas throughout the globe.
“As a woman one of the things that has been challenging to me is that men are often regarded as brave, and I’m regarded as reckless,” she said.
One of the most terrifying situations Logan endured on the job was covering the revolution in Egypt in 2011. While covering the celebration over the resignation of then-president Hosni Mubarak in Tahrir Square, Logan was separated from her CBS News colleagues and was beaten and sexually assaulted. The attack left Logan severely injured and hospitalized for days, but Logan credited a group of Egyptian women for saving her life.
She also discussed fighting breast cancer at the age of 41 when her son was 1 and her daughter was 2 years old, the impact of being able to visit medical facilities around the world, and, during a question-and-answer session, weighed in on the current state of journalism and the impact social media and the internet has made on her field.
“On one hand I have access to an enormous amount of knowledge, and on the other hand that leads to an enormous opportunity for propaganda and misinformation,” she said.
But through all her own adventure, triumphs and tribulations, Logan maintained that it’s the ability and opportunity to share other people’s stories from across the world that keeps her doing what she does.
“What I love to see and to remember are those places and those people and all those stories, because for me, it was always about them and not about me” she said. “And my job at ‘60 Minutes’ and as a reporter is to find a way to be the vehicle for that story.”
The Florida Forum, now in its 27th season, is part of a fundraising effort by The Women’s Board of Wolfson Children’s Hospital to raise money to help sick children in the community.
