For the first time ever, Time magazine’s Person of the Year includes a deceased individual, Washington Post contributor Jamal Khashoggi. The journalist who was killed at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul in October is part of a group of journalists who have been targeted for their work. Time calls them “The Guardians.”

Khashoggi is not the only deceased honoree. Four magazine covers will feature the members of this group, which includes the journalists at the Capital Gazette in Annapolis, Maryland. In June, five employees at that newspaper were murdered by a gunman. 

The other two Person of the Year covers show the wives of Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, two Reuters journalists who were arrested in Myanmar while they were working on stories about the killings of Rohingya Muslims, a minority group in Myanmar. Their wives were photographed because the journalists remain behind bars.

The publication said its Person of the Year honor this year recognizes those “who have taken great risks in pursuit of greater truths.”

In addition to the four cover photos, “The Guardians” includes other noted journalists whose works are detailed in the Time article.

The other candidates for Person of the Year were President Trump, the March for Our Lives activists, families separated at the U.S.–Mexico border, Christine Blasey Ford, Vladimir Putin, Robert Mueller, movie director Ryan Coogler, South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in, and Meghan Markle.

Time has designated a Person of the Year every year since 1927, although it was originally called Man of the Year. Charles Lindbergh was the first designee, after making the first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. The 2006 Person of the Year was “You.” The first Woman of the Year was Wallis Simpson, later known as the Duchess of Windsor, in 1936.

“Person of the Year” can be a person, a group, an idea or an object that “most affected the news and our lives, for good or ill, and embodied what was important about the year, for better or for worse.” “The Guardians” are the antidote to what Time Editor-in-Chief Edward Felsenthal called “the manipulation and abuse of truth.”

Here in central Kansas, the dangers of reporting the news seem far-removed. But even sharing what is happening in our community is important, and subject to outcries of “Fake News” whenever people don’t like the message. As former Executive Director of the Kansas Press Association Doug Anstaett said, “Newspapers are still the best hope for telling the story of Kansas and America.”

So, while your local newspaper may not compare to The Guardians now called Person of the Year, there’s a sense of pride knowing we are a small part of that fellowship.