The Amish desire to live simply, apart from modern society, has always had real integrity. It’s not as if they courted media attention and then complained, like Tom and Katie, when the scrutiny got to be too much. They build the windows in their schools high enough to keep tourists from taking pictures. So throughout that week, I had to fight an unfamiliar instinct for a reporter: to leave these people alone. I settled on a method of going through a third person–a volunteer who worked with Amish people at the local fire station, for example–to see if any Amish wanted to talk (an approach that is usually more effective anyway). I heard that one reporter walked into a house while an Amish family was eating dinner. As revolted as I was by such a tactic, I wondered if perhaps she was a better journalist than I, willing to do anything to break news.
