Journalistic Ethics
Numerous journalists make unethical decisions during their careers, sometimes further diminishing public trust and confidence in the profession. Some journalists use deception to expose deception, citing occasions when it may be both necessary and ethical to break the law to expose a larger wrongdoing—to obtain false identities, for example, to show how easily false documents can be obtained. Others might practice misrepresentation to gather evidence of nursing home fraud, for example, by posing as a patient’s relative. Still other journalists, equally committed to serving the public good, may leap from concealed areas with cameras rolling to ambush unsuspecting adversaries. Later they may march with those same cameras, unannounced, into offices, businesses, and other private property.
The defense for such practices can be persuasive. “How else could we prove fraudulent practices at the cancer clinic unless we posed as cancer patients ourselves?” they ask. “If I hadn’t sneaked a look at documents in the DA’s office, our community might never have learned of prostitution kickbacks to local police,” another maintains. “Television is a visual medium; how else can we demonstrate the national problem of illegally obtained passports unless we misrepresent the identities of crew and misrepresent the reasons we’re shooting this footage?”
DEFINITION OF ETHICS
As such discussion implies, law and ethics are intertwined. Often, unethical activities also are illegal. Breaking and entering, theft, trespass, and intentional libel are but a few examples. However, ethics is a branch of philosophy, not of law, and the distinction between the two is clear. Whereas laws are rules of living and conduct enforced by an external authority (usually by means of penalties), ethics are the rules of living and conduct that you impose on yourself, or that your profession strongly suggests you should impose on yourself, and few enforceable penalties exist. At its core, ethics include your own determination of what is fair, truthful, accurate, compassionate, and responsible conduct.
EFFECTS OF COMPETITION
Many ethical problems that reporters encounter come from knowing the competition is in head-to-head combat—and pushing hard (Figure 15.1). In their zeal to be first with the best story, some reporters overstep the boundaries that define ethical behavior. Every few years a reporter gains national notoriety for faking news stories or plagiarizing the work of other reporters. Other reporters trample lawns, snoop in mailboxes, misrepresent their identities, speak falsehoods to reticent news sources to force responses, stage news events, and generally conduct themselves unprofessionally. The public takes note of such transgressions and, over time, journalists and their profession lose credibility because of it.
In the 1980s a third of U.S. citizens believed news reports were often inaccurate. In 2000 that number jumped to almost two-thirds of those polled, primarily because of the post-presidential election controversy in Florida that year. Gallup Poll interviews since then find that nearly 60 percent of those interviewed rated news stories as “often inaccurate,” with 36 percent rating them “accurate.”1 A CBS News/New York Times Poll conducted in 2006 found that only about half the respondents said they trusted the media “most of the time,” whereas more than a third said they believe news media tell the truth “only some of the time.”2 Again in a 2010 Gallup survey on media use and evaluation, only 12 percent of respondents said they had a great deal of trust in newspapers, television and radio news, while 57 percent said they trusted those media not very much or not at all.3 Confidence in newspapers and television news has reached near record lows, with only 1 in 4 Americans having “a great deal or quite a lot” of confidence in those media.4 The journalist’s most valuable asset is not simply the headline-making story, but credibility itself. If the audience does not find the journalism profession credible, little else matters.
FIGURE 15.1
The pressures of competition to be first with the best story can significantly influence the journalist’s ethical and professional conduct. Copyright © 2012 Scott Rensberger
SITUATIONAL ETHICS
One story after another invites the reporter and photojournalist to redefine ethical conduct. The practice of judging a situation based on the good that will likely come from a particular course of action is called situational ethics. As a philosophical theory, situational ethics can either help or harm the journalist. Will coverage of a suicide attempt illuminate the helplessness of unemployment, or is the journalist’s first obligation to save the person’s life? Is it the photographer’s duty to rescue victims from an overturned school bus or to shoot footage of the rescue for a story addressing the larger issue of school bus safety? The answers to such questions inevitably vary according to the story, its treatment, and the journalist covering the story.
Given that journalists as a class adhere to no universally accepted code of ethics, who then regulates the journalist’s conduct and establishes the norms for competence and ethical behavior? Traditionally, individuals and institutions throughout most levels of society have searched for methods to force journalists to conduct themselves ethically and to license them, if necessary, to achieve that objective.
LICENSING
The call to license journalists might even sound reasonable. Before doctors or lawyers can practice their professions, they must complete rigorous study, demonstrate their competence before peers, and be licensed in the state in which they practice. By contrast, anyone can become a journalist by assigning oneself the title; no license or formal review of competence is required. Yet journalists remain as accountable to their clients as lawyers and doctors, and their ethical behavior must be equally above reproach. Why, then, should journalists not have to meet the same standards as other professionals?
In the United States, a predominant attitude has been that journalists cannot be licensed, because to do so would be to license their ideas. Only journalists who disseminated an approved doctrine might qualify for licenses. If a journalist’s point of view differs from that of a review board, who can reasonably say such difference constitutes “incompetence?”
Because every administration and special interest group wants to cast itself in the most favorable light, and wants its views heard above all others, concepts like “competence” and “official doctrine” vary according to who is in power. If licensing were imposed, whose versions of truth should be used as the foundations on which to license journalists? Republicans? Democrats? Socialists? Protestants? Muslims? Jews? White supremacists? Abortion rights advocates? Right-to-life advocates? Hunting groups? Environmentalists? Conservative courts? Liberal courts? The most reasonable answer would seem to advocate the responsible dissemination of all ideas. Ultimately, the engine that drives a democracy is precisely the freedom to debate and to adopt and promote differing philosophies and points of view.
CONTRACT WITH THE PUBLIC
In the end, a far more powerful review board than any public agency or congressional law governs journalistic conduct in the United States. Each hour of each day, this same entity—the public—extends and renews the journalist’s license to operate, by virtue of its patronage. David Halberstam, former New York Times correspondent who received the Pulitzer Prize for his Vietnam War reporting, once likened the journalist’s press card to a social credit card that is subject to periodic renewal. While this social credit card is not a formal document, it represents an extension of trust that viewers can withdraw at will and without advance notice. Even when the public overlooks a journalist’s indiscretions, there remains a group of peers, employers, and even advertisers who can bring powerful sanctions against that journalist.
As the CBS reporter Edward R. Murrow once observed, “to be believable, [journalists] must be credible.” Today, as suspicions of malpractice increase, magazine and newspaper advertisements ask why reporters don’t at least practice the Code of Ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists (Sigma Delta Chi), a code outsiders sometimes view as a rough equivalent of the Hippocratic Oath for physicians. However, no code of ethics could answer every dilemma the journalist faces in covering the news.
AT ISSUE: IMAGE MANIPULATION
Photographs have the kind of authority over imagination today, which the printed word had yesterday, and the spoken word before that. They seem utterly real. They come, we imagine, directly to us without human meddling, and they are the most effortless food for the mind conceivable.
Walter Lippman
Public Opinion
Cultural values may have led earlier generations to believe in the inherent fairness and accuracy of reality-based video. Sometimes this category includes content on sites such as YouTube, Facebook, and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Such sites feature content ranging from comedy to satire, commentary, drama, personal perspectives, and political entertainment. They may turn to riveting and accurate news reporting and analysis from time to time, provided it builds ratings or enhances their brand. In the main, however, their primary emphasis is on peer-to-peer communication, advertising, entertainment, satire and comedy.
Note the distinction between reality-based video and reality-based programming. Today’s so-called reality programs may stage events; direct participants to perform certain activities; or imply through word, deed and omission that what you’re watching is reality. Such programs may feature ordinary people in supposedly unscripted situations, but their primary emphasis is on entertainment and sensationalism.
By contrast, legitimate video news organizations and comparable outlets strive to present accurate, fair and impartial news content. They place primary emphasis on reporting, packaging and disseminating accurate visual reports and stories of news, public affairs, and extended formats such as investigative specials and documentaries.
We expect news organizations, then, never to omit essential information and to avoid all fraudulence, manipulation, deception, and misrepresentation. Their obligation is to fairly reconstruct or represent what actually happened, or to fairly portray the person or issue in question. This may require alerting viewers they’re watching a staged or reenacted event, but that it fairly and accurately depicts what happened.
Not all communication is true, of course. Reporters make mistakes, misunderstand what they see and hear, omit vital facts or main points, trust inaccurate information they’ve confirmed with multiple sources, or accept at face value what police and political sources tell them. Producers, assignment editors and news directors sometimes influence story angles and content via personal bias, reliance upon assumptions or amended facts, or their inability to keep up with what’s happening in the field.
What to Do?
Despite our best intentions, technology sometimes outwits us. High definition television brings viewers face to face with people’s physical imperfections. With clarity roughly six times greater than analog television,5 high-def cameras magnify everything from acne scars to wrinkles, bags under the eyes, and poor makeup jobs. High-def studio lighting and adjustments in make-up help hide those imperfections for news anchors, but without similar lighting adjustments in the field an anchor, reporter or virtually anyone else can suddenly appear ten years older.6 Field lighting thus takes on greater importance than ever.
BOX 15.1 CLASSIC VIEWS OF ETHICAL NEWS PHOTOGRAPHY IN JOURNALISM
“Journalism,” says Toledo Blade ombudsman Jack Lessenberry, “is supposed to show the world as it is, not as we would like it to be. That is perfectly understood by anyone who gets into the business. To do otherwise is to lie not only to your boss, but to your market--the public you serve.7
“Multimedia journalism demands that you learn how to gather and edit audio and video content, and write web-based articles, create podcasts, and sometimes produce blogs. Such multi-tasking invites journalists to create troublesome shortcuts,” says Rich Beckman, ‘new journalism educator’ and Knight Chair in Visual Journalism at the University of Miami. “We need ambient sound, but lack the time to record it on location. Why not just use stock sound available on-line or from the station’s audio library, or transfer an audio track from one soccer game and use it in another? The point is, “borrowed” sound never amounts to actual content recorded at the source. It never existed until you created it. It is an inaccurate representation.”8
The same considerations apply to digitally altered still photographs and video. While such editing may make an image, whether still or moving, more esthetically pleasing, it still amounts to falsification, writes Donald R. Winslow, editor of Photographer Magazine. Purists may argue that composition, exposure, even the photographic angle itself amount to editorial manipulation, thus impacting viewer perceptions of content and meaning. Audiences need to know they are watching reconstructions of actual events, rather than recreations embellished to create greater viewer appeal. For such reasons, respectable media organizations avoid image manipulation.9
“It’s never okay to digitally alter news photographs, even for the supposed purpose of ‘good taste,’ ” says News Photographer editor Donald Winslow.10
Make Your Case About Digital Manipulation
In the main, either an employer provides ethical guidelines to follow, or else you must decide for yourself what is right or wrong. The following questions can help you define, perhaps challenge, your ethical viewpoints regarding digital manipulation. As you answer each question, please assume your mandate is to present accurate, fair and impartial news content at all times.
1. It’s often said, “Perception is reality.” How do you define the differences?
2. Consider the different meanings of “reality” and “perception, and “a reality.” To what extent do the terms represent any similarities?
3. Do you believe it’s possible to capture what really happened with a single still or video camera, or even several cameras? Please explain your viewpoint.
4. In your experience, is it reasonable to assume every photographer will photograph or otherwise document the same event from the same locations, angles, focal length lens settings, camera settings, composition, time, or lighting conditions? If yes, please explain why you so believe. If you believe such an outcome is statistically impossible, explain how such differences in approach might impact the viewer’s perception of reality.
5. Do you believe you have or will encounter situations in your own life where you must earn and keep the public trust? If yes, please list five representative situations that might require your most ethical conduct while gathering, photographing, writing and editing the content in question.
6. As a professional in a competitive media environment, is it possible to capture reality, or only to reconstruct a reasonable characterization of how you saw and photographed something?
7. If two photographers cover the same event or issue, what might prevent audiences from coming away with the same perceptions of what happened or was considered? Could a still or video editor, graphic artist, or even a writer, similarly impact meanings through choice of words, artwork or typography? Explain how or why not.
8. Are not images much the same as words whose meanings people perceive subjectively, according to their own teaching, prior experience and emotional makeup?
9. To what extent does the still camera capture “truth”—that is, can a single photo capture an accurate, representative portrayal of reality—whether of a subject, event, or issue—in a single photograph? Explain either how that might be possible, or why it’s impossible. Provide an image that proves your point.
10. Is it possible to lie about or misrepresent reality with a still camera? With a video camera? Please explain your viewpoint.
11. Assume you’re the manager at a newspaper, magazine or web production facility. The photo editor asks you to rule on a photo showing a winsome woman with facial blemishes. “They create too many distractions,” says the photo editor. “You’d never notice her blemishes in person, but they dominate the photo.” Do you tell editor to leave the photo as is, or to remove the blemishes with software? You might either decide, “Leave the photo as is,” or “Let’s make her look the same as she does in real life. That should harm no one.” As manager, what do you tell the photo editor, and how do you justify your decision to her?
12. As a photographer, explain how you could manipulate viewer feelings (emotional responses) with a still or video camera. Further, explain how you could influence viewer feelings by manipulating images or video using software.
13. Do you believe images or video can ever convey the same meaning as words? Why or why not?
14. Is one picture ever worth a thousand words? If no, why not? If yes, how so?
15. Is one word ever worth a thousand pictures? Please explain your viewpoint.
16. It’s said that images most often report to the heart, while the printed word reports first to the intellect. Do you believe that a viewer’s emotional reaction originates from something in the images you recorded, or in how you recorded them—or both? Explain your reasoning.
17. To what extent do you believe it’s acceptable for a legitimate news organization to manipulate a still image using Adobe Photoshop™ or InDesign™? How about manipulating video in Final Cut Pro™; Avid™; or Adobe Premiere™, or similar software?
18. Is a still photograph more accurate if you eliminate distractions that occurred naturally or unavoidably in the still photo you will show viewers? Assume, for example, you want to show a high school scoreboard but eliminate some tennis shoes that belong to students standing behind the scoreboard? Your editor says ‘change nothing.’ How do you make a case that it’s fair to eliminate unnecessary distractions, whether in writing or in images? Contrast your answer with the notion that journalists omit much of what they observe in written reports. Are not their omissions made to reinforce clarity? In what ways is the written report different from editing a photo to enhance clarity or eliminate distractions and the non-essential?
19. Do you believe it’s acceptable to use software to change the exposure or contrast in a photo?
20. Back to the scoreboard: what will you say and do if the same editor who told you not to eliminate legs and feet, now wants you to enhance the same shot’s exposure and contrast so viewers can see minute but important detail that otherwise would remain invisible? What if the winning coach could see game time remaining, but the losing coach couldn’t see the scoreboard against the sun’s glare? If the story hinges on the losing coach’s inability to see the scoreboard, what should the image show? If the story hinges on the winning coach’s advantage, what should the image show? Which best represents “reality” or what actually happened?
21. Composition sometimes is defined as showing viewers what you want them to see. Is it acceptable to recompose a shot with your camera while in the field?
22. Is it ever acceptable to crop or recompose a shot with software after you return from the field?
23. Is it acceptable while in the field to soften contrast or color if you only use lens filters or change exposure? How about using software after you return from the field? What do you say if a team member or superior demands that your still photo or video is “too harsh—make it look like it really was just before dawn?”
24. Long focal length lenses, wide apertures, and long distances between a subject and your camera can result in backgrounds that appear out of focus. Should you ever use a certain focal length lens, or perhaps change distance between the camera and subject to place viewer attention where you want it within the frame? To sharpen focus or soften it? Is it acceptable to use software to manipulate depth of field in the image after you return from the field? Why or why not? Under what conditions, if any?
25. Is composing a shot or scene in the field with the zoom lens more ethical than recomposing or cropping it with computer software? If so, in what way?
26. Zooming in no way replicates how viewers see an event. The human eye never zooms. Is a zoom therefore ethically permissible in video shots? Why or why not?
27. The human eye cannot pan a scene like a video camera does. The eye looks here, then there, and forms a composite of all the “shots” it takes. Is a panning movement therefore ethically prohibited? Why or why not?
28. Assume that a person photographed under indoor fluorescent light shows up on screen with a greenish skin tone. Later in a video story or photo spread, a different person photographed under incandescent light appears orangish-yellow. In both cases, the photographer forgot about color balance. Is it ethically warranted to digitally manipulate these shots to more accurately portray a person as they appear in real life? Please explain your position. Does your answer conflict with anything you’ve said elsewhere in this section?
29. A renowned media ethicist conducts an ethics workshop at your organization. During the presentation, he shows two video network news stories, both identical except for one difference. The original photographer produced both videos, using the same equipment, with the same settings and composition, and edited them identically. The first video tells the story on a sunny day; the second video shows the story on a rainy, fog-shrouded day. Viewers saw only one story, not both. In your view, does one version distort the “truth” more than another? Could viewers watch either video and come away with the same understanding and sense of place? A) Please explain why or why not. (Note: You may have read elsewhere that the heart of most good stories lies in how story subjects react to situations that confront them. B) Could both stories convey the journalist’s identical message and focus, or would the weather—and changes in mood and subject reaction—alter what viewers remember about the story and the central character? ■
CASE STUDIES IN ETHICAL DILEMMAS
With few opportunities to define ethical standards under the pressure of deadlines and instant reporting, journalists must establish solid editorial and ethical philosophies before those dilemmas arise. The following situations are offered to help the reporter and photojournalist accomplish that objective. They encompass such situations as trespass, illegal surveillance, and invasion of privacy. As in most ethical deliberations, there are few answers, mostly questions.
As you consider the following ethical situations,11 you might want to know that professional journalists were divided in roughly equal numbers about whether to proceed in such circumstances or to avoid becoming involved. Panels that addressed these issues convened at the NPPA Television News-Video Workshop. Panel members included news directors, photographers, and reporters. Videos of the first four panels are available from the National Press Photographers Association, 3200 Croasdaile Drive, Suite 306, Durham, NC 27705. Also, see http://nppa.org/. The legal principles raised here are addressed in Chapter 14, Law and the Digital Journalist. You’ll find a discussion of each situation at the end of this chapter. For more case studies, see http://journalism.indiana.edu/resources/ethics/
Trespass
Case 1. Safety officials have condemned an abandoned, privately owned building and posted it as unfit for human habitation. The owner has constructed a fence to keep out transients and children who might otherwise enter. “No trespassing” signs are prominently posted.
Last evening a child died and two others were injured when a stairway collapsed inside the building. A community citizens group says the building is one of dozens that pose such dangers. You are assigned to shoot video and a reporter standup inside the building. You can’t locate the owner to obtain permission to enter the building, but police suggest they might look the other way should you decide to trespass. Will you enter the building illegally or stay out?
Case 2. You are researching an investigative report about a palm reader who is said to con elderly people out of their life savings. You visit the palm reader at her place of business and she tells you to get lost. Later you decide to visit her at her residence. A “No trespassing” sign is posted on the front gate of the fence around her property. Will you go up to her house and knock on the door? Will you jump the fence if the gate is locked?
Surveillance Photography
The palm reader regularly invites elderly people to her residence, where you believe she conducts many of her con operations. One night you notice she has left the curtains open and the shades up, and you can see her sitting at a table with people who appear to be clients. Will you stand on the street and photograph the woman’s activities through the open window? Will you try to obtain sound with a shotgun or parabolic microphone?
Hostage Coverage
Case 1. An emotionally disturbed man holds hostages inside a sleazy bar. He says he’ll kill one of the hostages unless he can broadcast a message to his wife. Police ask you to loan them your video camera so two of their officers can pose as a reporter-photographer crew to gain entry to the bar. You don’t have time to contact the assignment desk or news director for advice. What will you decide?
Case 2. A distraught father holds his children hostage in a private home. Through the window, he can see your camera. He opens the door and shouts that he’ll kill himself unless you leave the area. Unknown to the man, police plan to rush the house in about fifteen minutes, and your assignment editor has told you not to miss the action. Do you retreat? When police rush the house, do you follow right behind them to photograph this dramatic, if unpredictable and possibly dangerous, moment?
Entrapment
To show how easy it is for minors to buy liquor, you send a seventeen-year-old minor into a couple of liquor stores, record video of the purchases through the store windows with a long lens from a van across the street, then walk into both stores, camera rolling, to interview the clerks. The clerks protest that you are guilty of entrapment and ambush journalism. How do you reply?
Invasion of Privacy
You wish to document a historic medical procedure in which your cameras would peer inside the patient’s body. The patient is too ill to respond to your request. The doctors will give their approval, provided the patient’s family doesn’t object. You tell the family your audience has the right to see this moment of history unfolding. The family says, “Sorry, but we don’t want our relative to become a sideshow for TV news people. Permission denied.” What should you (and your station) do next?
Violence
Case 1. You cover a demonstration that turns violent. Four persons are injured. Your camera is rolling as a demonstrator steps into the frame, shoots, and kills a police dog. Police club some demonstrators. Elsewhere, demonstrators threaten police officers with baseball bats. Will you show this violence on the evening news to give the audience an accurate portrayal of the event?
Case 2. You’re photographing a federal informer as he walks along a courthouse hallway between two marshals. Suddenly a man steps from a telephone booth and shoots the informer dead. You capture the event on video. Will you show the scene of the killing on tonight’s news? If your competition shows it?
Protecting Confidential Sources
You’re preparing a story on a radical terrorist group. You promise not to reveal sources or confidential information when you first talk with the terrorist leader. Later he tells you the group has lost control of one of its members who plans to bomb the federal court building tomorrow night. Will you go to the police or FBI with your information?
Breaking and Entering
You’re producing a half-hour special on drug use in your city and have learned the address of a drug dealer. You go to the house, but no one answers when you knock on the door. You then notice that a window is open. You determine the house is vacant. Will you climb inside to check out the place or will you not enter the house?
Destroying police Evidence
A person has been stabbed to death in a hotel. You arrive with your camera just as police arrive. The detective, an old acquaintance, tells you to go in, shoot your video, and leave before crime lab technicians arrive. He says if you don’t act now, the technicians won’t let you in for fear you might disturb evidence, perhaps even destroy clues to the murderer’s identity. The detective doesn’t seem all that worried that your presence inside the room might destroy evidence. Do you shoot the murder scene or not enter the room at all?
Televising Executions
Your state has approved your right to televise live broadcasts of executions. Your news director believes the public is ready for live broadcasts, but he wants to record the execution for broadcast during the late evening news for the event’s “deterrent value.” The general manager also has endorsed a delayed broadcast of the execution, citing her belief that if a society endorses capital punishment, then citizens should see the consequences. What do you say—and do?
Covering Suicide Attempts
Case 1. You’re en route to work when your assignment editor calls you about a woman who’s threatened to jump from a bridge with her one-year-old child in her arms unless her estranged husband returns immediately and makes up his arrears in alimony. You’re one of the first people on the scene. When you arrive, the mother makes a further demand that your station broadcast a live appeal from her to her husband. A woman who identifies herself as the distraught woman’s mother runs up to her daughter, clutches her, and says to you, “Put down that damn camera and help me grab her!” Do you put down your camera, or do you continue to record video?
Case 2. A man who is emotionally disturbed has perched himself atop an office building and says he plans to jump to his death because his protracted unemployment has made it impossible for him to provide for his family. He’s telephoned your station and competing stations to advise newsrooms of his planned suicide. Do you cover the event?
Illegally Obtained Information
You’re at the district attorney’s office. He leaves the room to find some information you’ve requested. While you wait, you notice an interesting file folder lying open on his desk. Do you look at the top page? The top three or four pages? Do you make notes if the information appears to be of interest? If the file folder is closed, would you open it, especially if you believe it could provide information important to a story you’re doing?
Yielding Editorial Control of News Content
A truck carrying nuclear warheads overturns on a highway in your area. The defense department prohibits any photographers at the area on grounds of safety and national security. Defense department officials say they will escort reporters into the area and permit them to photograph selected views of the accident, on condition they submit all video recordings for defense department screening before they are aired. Should you agree to these conditions to obtain footage?
Cooperating with Police
Inside an office building, now surrounded by a SWAT team, an armed man has shot out several windows and asked for a live television interview so he can broadcast his message to the public. Officers say that unless they can impersonate your crew, they may have to storm the building with resulting injury or loss of life. They promise you can air any of the footage they manage to record. If you hand over your credentials and camera to the police, will you air any footage or interviews the police manage to shoot? If you don’t hand over your camera, would you use video the police later shot with their own camera?
Private Lives of Public Officials
What will you do if you are the first to confirm information that a prominent individual, perhaps a state senator, is having an affair? Has been diagnosed as having a serious but not life-threatening illness? Is undergoing psychiatric counseling for marital difficulties? Is showing early signs of senility in everyday conduct, which, although not evident to the public, is readily apparent to a loyal staff? Is an alcoholic or abuses other drugs? Is gay or lesbian?
Misrepresentation
Case 1. You are sitting in a bar where you happen to engage in a conversation with the new city attorney. The attorney thinks you’re just another person at the bar and begins to open up, pouring out information that would make a great story. At this point, do you tell the attorney you’re a journalist or do you hide the fact?
Case 2. You’re investigating the death of a person who has died under mysterious circumstances. Relatives won’t talk, but someone in the newsroom suggests you obtain information from the victim’s relatives by posing as a coroner’s assistant. Will you act on this suggestion?
Accepting Favors
Few news operations allow their journalists to accept favors from news sources. In the past such favors have included free airline, sporting event, and concert tickets; books; meals; magazine subscriptions; taxi fares; and limousine service. Freebies are dangerous precisely because of their intent: to obligate journalists to news sources in the hope of at least some coverage or more favorable coverage.
Today the general wisdom is that if the public pays, so does the journalist. If the story is newsworthy, the station can afford to cover it. Most journalists would agree that it is permissible to accept something as insignificant in value as a cup of coffee or an hors d’oeuvre at a charity ball that is equally free to the public.
Reporting in Context
The television camera is notorious for its ability to isolate events from the larger environments in which they exist. The camera, focusing naturally on the drama and the spontaneous evolution of a news event, can turn the reality of a few flooded streets into the illusion of a flood-ravaged city. It can make the angry faces of a few hundred protesters seem like a mob of thousands, or the towering flames of an apartment house fire seem like a reenactment of the burning of Atlanta.
No news report makes its journey into the minds of all viewers intact, and the potential for misunderstanding increases when events are reported out of context. The next time protesters chain themselves to a railroad track to keep trains from carrying nuclear warheads through an urban area, it may be appropriate to contrast the protester’s viewpoint with the majority opinion of the rest of the city’s residents. Although it is important to show the event, and to provide a vicarious experience of what happened, it is equally important to place the story in perspective.
REVERSE-ANGLE QUESTIONS
As in all questions of ethics, the overriding precaution is to do nothing that would unjustifiably inflict damage on others or that anyone could misperceive and later use to damage the journalist’s credibility. The advice applies to the practice of shooting reverse-angle questions after the interviewee has left the scene. Perhaps the reporter has phrased the question ineptly and wishes to restate it more articulately, this time on camera, or perhaps the reverse-angle question will be employed as an editing device to condense the interview with no loss of visual continuity.
To preserve one’s journalistic integrity, reverse-angle questions must be asked while the interviewee is still present. The reporter may wish to give the interviewee a simple explanation of the need for such a shot. Otherwise, accusations may surface that the interview was edited out of context or that the interviewee was made to appear to say things he or she never said and does not believe.
STAGED NEWS EVENTS
Occasionally you may need to stage an event to be photographed. In fact, numerous news events are staged. Interviews and news conferences are among those events in which the time, location, and even the content and context are determined in advance (Figure 15.2). This form of staging is normally acceptable because it’s so apparent to the viewer. The audience recognizes that no one can force interviewees to answer questions against their will, although unethical reporters have been known to coach persons to answer interview questions with predetermined answers. When we stage unfairly, we create something that did not exist. It would not have happened in our absence. When we stage fairly, we recreate what already existed—what would have happened even in our absence.
Not every instance of staging needs to be identified. No breach of ethics should occur if you ask subjects to perform some action common to their everyday routine that, even in your absence, they would normally perform anyway. You might, for example, wish to ask a person to come through the door to her office again, so you can reshoot the scene from a more appropriate angle. Perhaps an artist is not working in her studio the day you wish to shoot. No loss of public confidence should result if you ask the artist to sit down in the studio and paint for a few minutes, so you can shoot some video for your story. It is perhaps less ethical to tell the artist where to sit, how to sit, or what to paint, or to rearrange any part of the studio or any other environment to create a more pleasing composition for your own shots.
REENACTMENTS
Reenactment also is occasionally permissible. Perhaps you want to show how psychiatrists treat child abuse victims, but don’t wish to interrupt therapy or invade the actual victim’s privacy. Use reenactments sparingly, and anytime you do reenact an event, tell your audience. They will respect your candor, and their belief in what you show and tell them will increase.
Another example of reenactment, potentially far more damaging to the reporter’s credibility, is illustrated in the following scenario:
Reporting crews from three television stations have just arrived to interview a presidential candidate’s state campaign manager the morning after the candidate’s victory in the New Hampshire primary.
While the crews are still setting up but not yet rolling, they hear the campaign manager tell someone on the telephone, “I think we’re going to take this state as easily as we took New Hampshire.” All three stations miss the bite, but start rolling in hopes they can capture a similar statement before the campaign manager hangs up.
The conversation continues, but now the campaign manager is voicing a series of “uh huh’s” into the telephone. Finally, one reporter hands the campaign manager a note that reads, “Talk about New Hampshire.”
Finally, the campaign manager tells the person on the other end of the telephone, “Some reporters here want me to talk to you about New Hampshire,” and he proceeds to talk about the previous day’s primary victory. That night, some of the stations air the comments as if they were made during a spontaneous telephone conversation.
Of the numerous questions that surround such reporting methods, two are paramount. First, should the reporter have prompted the campaign manager to restate his original comments? Second, should reporters from the other stations have aired those comments as if they originated spontaneously? Does the note differ in its intent, had another journalist prompted the campaign manager verbally, using the same words? Beyond the general subject, does the note suggest in any way what the campaign manager should say?
Some reporters would air the comments. Others would avoid airing them altogether. Still others answer the first two questions by asking a third: Would the audience have approved if it could have peered over the reporter’s shoulder as he handed the campaign manager that note?
FILE VIDEO
Always identify file video to prevent any possibility that viewers believe the old video is current. Many stations label such video “File,” “File Video,” or “Library Footage” and often include the date it first aired. Often, you may have only a few crucial seconds of video to illustrate a story that advances over time (stale footage showing the aftermath of an airline crash as the investigation advances over weeks, months, or even years, for example, or perhaps old footage of a murder suspect walking to court as the trial, sentencing, and appeal processes run their course). Ideally, use such file video sparingly and try to advance it over time to avoid endless repetition.
MATERIAL PROVIDED BY OUTSIDE SOURCES
Equally important is the need to identify all video that comes from any source outside your newsroom. Normally, the origin of network and news syndication stories is self-evident. In everything from mike flags, screen graphics, and reporter signoffs, the authorship and logos of network and syndication services receive obvious and prominent treatment. The biggest problem occurs with video news releases and footage from businesses, public relations firms, government agencies, and other special interest groups. Such stories arrive at the station free of cost, and reduced budgets make their use tempting. Stations frequently produce their own stories from such footage, updating and localizing the material as warranted, and may use their own reporters and anchors to voice such stories from the studio.12 Unless stations identify the source, audiences have no way to know the story may represent a special interest point of view.
TOWARD AN INDIVIDUAL CODE OF ETHICS
Ethics can be thought of as promoting fair play, even for those individuals and institutions we dislike. Often the best response to a news situation is detachment, the hallmark on which objective reporting is founded. But ethical reporting is more than the simple transmission of facts and truth, and it is more than fairness and accuracy. It is also the dedication to good taste and to a regard for human dignity and life. Not infrequently, ethical reporting is possible only when the journalist has made a much broader ethical commitment to be sensitive in reporting how others live, believe, and behave.13 Sensitivity and compassion are not frequently mentioned as journalistic virtues or as prerequisites for employment, but they are qualities the public can rightfully demand from a profession often noted, and occasionally disdained, for its cynicism.
As you develop a personal code of ethics, you may wish to consider the following guidelines. They form the basis for many individual codes of ethics in journalism:
■ Broadcast only information that you know to be accurate, fair, and complete.
■ Tell your audience what you don’t know.
■ If you make a mistake, tell your audience.
■ Respect the privacy of others.
■ Do nothing to misrepresent your identity.
■ Whenever you disclose information that damages a person’s reputation, disclose the source.
■ Leave the making of secret recordings to authorized officials.
■ Respect the right of all individuals to a fair trial.
■ Promise confidentiality to a source only if you are willing to be jailed to protect the source.
■ Pay for your own meals, travel, special events tickets, books, music, personal items, and services.
■ Accept only gifts, admissions, and services that are free of obligation and equally available to the public.
■ Avoid outside employment or other activities that might damage your ability to report fairly or might appear to influence your ability to be fair.
■ Avoid making endorsements of products or institutions.
■ Guard against arrogance and bad taste in your reports.
■ Stay out of bushes and dark doorways.
■ Never break a law to expose a wrong.
Many news organizations also encourage employees to follow the guidelines in the Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA) and National Press Photographers Association (NPPA) codes of ethics.
BOX 15.2 CODE OF ETHICS AND PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT
Radio Television Digital News Association
The Radio Television Digital News Association, wishing to foster the highest professional standards of electronic journalism, promote public understanding of and confidence in electronic journalism, and strengthen principles of journalistic freedom to gather and disseminate information, establishes this Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct.
Preamble
Professional electronic journalists should operate as trustees of the public, seek the truth, report it fairly and with integrity and independence, and stand accountable for their actions.
Public Trust
Professional electronic journalists should recognize that their first obligation is to the public.
Professional electronic journalists should:
• Understand that any commitment other than service to the public undermines trust and credibility.
• Recognize that service in the public interest creates an obligation to reflect the diversity of the community and guard against oversimplification of issues or events.
• Provide a full range of information to enable the public to make enlightened decisions.
• Fight to ensure that the public’s business is conducted in public.
Truth
Professional electronic journalists should pursue truth aggressively and present the news accurately, in context, and as completely as possible.
Professional electronic journalists should:
• Continuously seek the truth.
• Resist distortions that obscure the importance of events.
• Clearly disclose the origin of information and label all material provided by outsiders.
Professional electronic journalists should not:
• Report anything known to be false.
• Manipulate images or sounds in any way that is misleading.
• Plagiarize.
• Present images or sounds that are reenacted without informing the public.
Fairness
Professional electronic journalists should present the news fairly and impartially, placing primary value on significance and relevance.
Professional electronic journalists should:
• Treat all subjects of news coverage with respect and dignity, showing particular compassion to victims of crime or tragedy.
• Exercise special care when children are involved in a story and give children greater privacy protection than adults.
• Seek to understand the diversity of their community and inform the public without bias or stereotype.
• Present a diversity of expressions, opinions, and ideas in context.
• Present analytical reporting based on professional perspective, not personal bias.
• Respect the right to a fair trial.
Integrity
Professional electronic journalists should present the news with integrity and decency, avoiding real or perceived conflicts of interest, and respect the dignity and intelligence of the audience as well as the subjects of news.
Professional electronic journalists should:
• Identify sources whenever possible. Confidential sources should be used only when it is clearly in the public interest to gather or convey important information or when a person providing information might be harmed. Journalists should keep all commitments to protect a confidential source.
• Clearly label opinion and commentary.
• Guard against extended coverage of events or individuals that fails to significantly advance a story, place the event in context, or add to the public knowledge.
• Refrain from contacting participants in violent situations while the situation is in progress.
• Use technological tools with skill and thoughtfulness, avoiding techniques that skew facts, distort reality, or sensationalize events.
• Use surreptitious newsgathering techniques, including hidden cameras or microphones, only if there is no other way to obtain stories of significant public importance and only if the technique is explained to the audience.
• Disseminate the private transmissions of other news organizations only with permission.
Professional electronic journalists should not:
• Pay news sources who have a vested interest in a story.
• Accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might seek to influence coverage.
• Engage in activities that may compromise their integrity or independence.
Independence
Professional electronic journalists should defend the independence of all journalists from those seeking influence or control over news content.
Professional electronic journalists should:
• Gather and report news without fear or favor, and vigorously resist undue influence from any outside forces, including advertisers, sources, story subjects, powerful individuals, and special interest groups.
• Resist those who would seek to buy or politically influence news content or who would seek to intimidate those who gather and disseminate the news.
• Determine news content solely through editorial judgment and not as the result of outside influence.
• Resist any self-interest or peer pressure that might erode journalistic duty and service to the public.
• Recognize that sponsorship of the news will not be used in any way to determine, restrict, or manipulate content.
• Refuse to allow the interests of ownership or management to influence news judgment and content inappropriately.
• Defend the rights of the free press for all journalists, recognizing that any professional or government licensing of journalists is a violation of that freedom.
Accountability
Professional electronic journalists should recognize that they are accountable for their actions to the public, the profession, and themselves.
Professional electronic journalists should:
• Actively encourage adherence to these standards by all journalists and their employers.
• Respond to public concerns. Investigate complaints and correct errors promptly and with as much prominence as the original report.
• Explain journalistic processes to the public, especially when practices spark questions or controversy.
• Recognize that professional electronic journalists are duty-bound to conduct themselves ethically.
• Refrain from ordering or encouraging courses of action that would force employees to commit an unethical act.
• Carefully listen to employees who raise ethical objections and create environments in which such objections and discussions are encouraged.
• Seek support for and provide opportunities to train employees in ethical decision-making.
In meeting its responsibility to the profession of electronic journalism, RTNDA has created this code to identify important issues, to serve as a guide for its members, to facilitate self-scrutiny, and to shape future debate.
Source: Adopted at RTNDA 2000 in Minneapolis, MN, September 14, 2000. Reprinted by permission of the Radio-Television News Directors Association (renamed in 2009 as the Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA).
BOX 15.3 CODE OF ETHICS
National Press Photographers Association
Preamble
The National Press Photographers Association, a professional society that promotes the highest standards in photojournalism, acknowledges concern for every person’s need both to be fully informed about public events and to be recognized as part of the world in which we live.
Photojournalists operate as trustees of the public. Our primary role is to report visually on the significant events and on the varied viewpoints in our common world. Our primary goal is the faithful and comprehensive depiction of the subject at hand. As photojournalists, we have the responsibility to document society and to preserve its history through images.
Photographic and video images can reveal great truths, expose wrongdoing and neglect, inspire hope and understanding and connect people around the globe through the language of visual understanding. Photographs can also cause great harm if they are callously intrusive or are manipulated.
This code is intended to promote the highest quality in all forms of photojournalism and to strengthen public confidence in the profession. It is also meant to serve as an educational tool both for those who practice and for those who appreciate photojournalism. To that end, The National Press Photographers Association sets forth the following Code of Ethics:
Code of Ethics
Photojournalists and those who manage visual news productions are accountable for upholding the following standards in their daily work:
1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.
2. Resist being manipulated by staged photo opportunities.
3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and work to avoid presenting one’s own biases in the work.
4. Treat all subjects with respect and dignity. Give special consideration to vulnerable subjects and compassion to victims of crime or tragedy. Intrude on private moments of grief only when the public has an overriding and justifiable need to see.
5. While photographing subjects do not intentionally contribute to, alter, or seek to alter or influence events.
6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images’ content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in any way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.
7. Do not pay sources or subjects or reward them materially for information or participation.
8. Do not accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might seek to influence coverage.
9. Do not intentionally sabotage the efforts of other journalists.
Ideally, photojournalists should:
1. Strive to ensure that the public’s business is conducted in public. Defend the rights of access for all journalists.
2. Think proactively, as a student of psychology, sociology, politics and art to develop a unique vision and presentation. Work with a voracious appetite for current events and contemporary visual media.
3. Strive for total and unrestricted access to subjects, recommend alternatives to shallow or rushed opportunities, seek a diversity of viewpoints, and work to show unpopular or unnoticed points of view.
4. Avoid political, civic, and business involvements or other employment that compromise or give the appearance of compromising one’s own journalistic independence.
5. Strive to be unobtrusive and humble in dealing with subjects.
6. Respect the integrity of the photographic moment.
7. Strive by example and influence to maintain the spirit and high standards expressed in this code. When confronted with situations in which the proper action is not clear, seek the counsel of those who exhibit the highest standards of the profession. Photojournalists should continuously study their craft and the ethics that guide it.
Source: Reprinted by permission of the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA).
SUMMARY
Ethics are rules of living and conduct that you impose on yourself or those your profession strongly suggests you should follow. Laws, by contrast, are rules of living and conduct that are enforced by an external authority, usually by means of penalties.
The pressures of competition tempt some journalists to commit unethical practices. Sooner or later, however, such acts end up reflecting unfavorably on the profession at large. Other problems can result when journalists practice situational ethics, the practice of determining what to do from one situation to the next on the basis of the good that will likely result from a particular course of action.
In the absence of a universally accepted code of ethics, it falls to the individual journalist to determine what is good and bad, right and wrong, fair and unfair. Given the indiscretions of some journalists, ranging from accepting favors and staging news to trespass and entrapment, some groups and individuals would seek to impose their own notions of ethical behavior on journalists and to license them. However, ideas, unlike pharmaceuticals and vending machines, are difficult to license.
In the end, the public extends to journalists somewhat the equivalent of a license to operate through its trust and patronage. Without these fundamental components in place, no journalist can be heard.
KEY TERMS
ethics 264
NPPA 278
RTDNA 278
situational ethics 266
DISCUSSION
1. Describe the essential differences between ethics and law.
2. Based on your observations of news coverage and promotion, discuss how competitive pressures can influence the journalist’s ethical decisions.
3. Discuss what role situational ethics should play in your professional career.
4. Describe from personal observation any reporting practices with which you disagree.
5. Discuss your views about the wisdom of licensing journalists to (a) certify journalistic competency and (b) help ensure fairness in reporting.
6. In the absence of review boards and licensing boards for journalists, what other forces exist to help ensure that the journalist reports fairly and competently?
7. Under what circumstances, if any, are reenactments of stories ethically defensible?
8. Should a journalist refuse all gifts or just those above a certain value (ten dollars and higher? twenty-five dollars and up?)? What about a cup of coffee at a restaurant? A drink at a bar? A meal? A movie ticket?
9. Under what circumstances is it acceptable for a journalist to hold another paying job, say as a speechwriter for a public relations company or as a video editor for an industrial telecommunications company?
10. As a journalist, when is it permissible for you to accept pay from a special interest group for a speech you make? To shoot video for a paid political spot?
11. When is it acceptable for you to publish information about a public official that you learned secondhand because your spouse or friend works in close association with that public official?
12. Under what circumstances, if any, is secret recording ethical?
EXERCISES
1. Respond to your choice of any five of the ethical conflict situations that begin on page 271 of this chapter, and defend your answers.
2. Choose five individuals to play the roles of (1) assignment editor, (2) news director, (3) person in the news, (4) photographer, and (5) reporter. Ask penetrating questions to prompt the various individuals to respond to the ethical conflict situations beginning on page 271 and lead them to defend their responses.
3. Invite working journalists, perhaps a reporter-photographer team from a local station, to describe how they would react to the ethical conflict situations outlined in this chapter.
4. Make a list of favors you would accept without reservation from news sources and those you would refuse to accept under any circumstances. Explain your decisions.
5. Construct a personal code of journalistic ethics that you will follow as a working professional.
DISCUSSION OF ETHICAL CONFLICT SITUATIONS
Following are discussions of possible scenarios in response to the ethical conflict situations posed on pages 271–275. Your answers may vary, and you can expect a spirited defense of differing points of view whether you raise these issues in class discussion or with working professionals. In the end, there is no “right” answer, unless the response you advocate runs counter to humanitarian considerations; would harm an individual’s safety, reputation, or mental well-being; results in the breaking of a law; or runs contrary to your station’s ethical guidelines.
Trespass
Case 1. Discussion. You could be guilty of trespassing unless you obtain permission to enter the building. If you are unable to locate the owner, ask a police officer to give you permission to enter the building. If you are later challenged, you can at least cite your decision to act based on “apparent authority.”
Case 2. Even with a “No trespassing” sign on the front gate, there would seem to be little harm in knocking on the woman’s door. You have virtually no other way to announce your presence. If the gate is locked and you jump the fence, however, you may be guilty of trespassing.
Surveillance photography
If the palm reader leaves her curtains open and her shades up, she might be expected to know that someone might attempt to take a picture. If you attempt to record sound with a shotgun or parabolic mike, however, the judge might rule that the palm reader had a reasonable expectation to privacy in her private conversations, even though her windows were open.
Hostage Coverage
Case 1. In this instance, the police have chosen to misrepresent their identity. If you hand over your camera, you have chosen only to lend the police a camera. If the man holding hostages calls your station to confirm that the individuals with your camera are station employees, not police, serious harm could result to the hostages, especially if the assignment desk or news director is uninformed of your decision.
Case 2. In the first instance, retreat. Don’t endanger the man’s life or his children’s lives. In the second instance, when police do rush the house, your decision to follow immediately behind the police involves your own safety. No story is worth your life.
Entrapment
You have asked a minor to break the law by purchasing liquor, a common example of breaking the law to expose a wrongdoing. This job may better be left to police. You can then record the purchase through the window with a long lens from a van parked across the street, because generally you can photograph anything that you can see from a public location. The tactic of walking, unannounced, into the liquor store with camera rolling is less ethical. Ambush journalism gives interview subjects no time to collect their thoughts or to respond to questions in a rational, thoughtful way.
Invasion of privacy
Honor the family’s wishes. Wait for another day and another time when you do have permission. If you are convinced your cause is right, state your case once again, gently.
Violence
Case 1. The violence is the most eloquent statement you have to communicate the essence of this story. To edit it out would be to portray the demonstration as far more benign than it was. Be cautious, however, to avoid showing activities that would violate ordinary sensibilities and good taste.
Case 2. Some stations air such footage, others convert it to a still-frame graphic or substitute a still photograph obtained from a newspaper photographer. Some viewers will expect to see the actual footage; other viewers will be outraged if you show it. The judgment call is yours.
Protecting Confidential Sources
The first step could be for you to plead with your source to inform the police or FBI himself. Otherwise, you might notify the police anonymously, without naming your source or his group, although such action would violate your promise not to reveal confidential information. You might also wish to inform your source of your decision to call police. If you fail to tell police, your decision could result in property damage and injury or death to innocent persons.
Breaking and Entering
Stay outside. Call police. Cover the action if they decide to enter the premises.
Destroying Police Evidence
You are better off staying outside. Murder trials can be lost over allegations of destruction of evidence.
Televising Executions
If viewers are given sufficient warning and time to prepare for a delayed broadcast, then they can choose to watch or tune away from the broadcast as they wish. Unsuspecting viewers, however, may still tune into the delayed broadcast. To broadcast the execution live might capitalize on the event more nearly for sensational or shock value, because an understanding of capital punishment and its deterrent value is far more complex than watching a person being put to death on live television.
Covering Suicide Attempts
Case 1. Delay the woman by calling the station. Do what you can to help save her and her child. Human decency and compassion take precedence over this story.
Case 2. Do not cover the story. If you do, you will be subject to this form of modified “hostage taking” for months to come. Anyone with a message could threaten suicide and expect you to come running.
Illegally Obtained Information
Keep your eyes where they belong. Curiosity might kill the cat in this case, especially if the DA has planted the folder for your benefit anyway. Even if the information was accurate, it would be illegally or at least unethically obtained.
Yielding Editorial Control of News Content
Air the footage, provided you tell viewers how it was obtained. Later, you may want to do a follow-up story to show the potential consequences of moving hazardous materials through populated areas.
Cooperating with Police
Air the footage and interviews, provided you inform your audience how the footage was obtained.
Private Lives of Public Officials
If the official’s situation affects his or her ability to conduct the office, report it. Otherwise, let the information remain private. If the competition reports information that you believe should be kept private, refrain from reporting it. Most members of your audience will respect your decision.
Misrepresentation
Case 1. Inform the city attorney of your identity when he first begins to take you into his confidence.
Case 2. The misrepresentation of a journalist’s identity may lead viewers to discredit the honor and integrity of all journalists. Don’t pose as the coroner’s assistant.
NOTES
1. Mark Gillespie, “Public Remains Skeptical of News Media,” a Gallup organization article, May 30, 2003, www.realnews247.com/gallup_public_remains_skeptical_of_news_media.htm (accessed June 8, 2007).
2. “CBS News/New York Times Poll. Jan. 20–25, 2006,” www.pollingreport.com/media.htm (accessed June 8, 2007).
3. Gallup, “Media Use and Evaluation,” http://www.gallup.com/poll/1663/rnedia-use-evaluation.aspx (accessed December 28, 2010).
4. Gallup, “In U.S., Confidence in Newspapers, TV News Remains a Rarity,” August 13, 2010, http://www.gallup.com/poll/142133/Confidence-Newspapers-News-Remains-Rarity.aspx (accessed December 28 2010).
5. Diane Holloway, “That’s Harsh: Hi-def TV is changing our views of the stars,” Cox News Services, 29 March 2007.
6. Ibid.
7. Donald R. Winslow, “Truth Will Out: Allen Detrich & The Toledo Blade,” News Photographer, (May 2007), 51.
8. Rich Beckman, “Those Who Put Us At Risk,” News Photographer, (May 2007), 14–15.
9. Donald R. Winslow, “Truth Will Out: Allen Detrich & The Toledo Blade,” News Photographer, (May 2007), 43–53.
10. Ibid, 12
11. Excerpted from a panel participation seminar, “Situation Ethics for the TV News Photographer,” presented by Dr. Carl C. Monk, then dean of Washburn University School of Law (Topeka, KS), at the National Press Photographers 24th Annual Television News-Video Workshop, Norman, OK, March 22, 1984, and drawing on discussions among professional journalists in similar sessions held at the workshop since then.
12. Jim Redmond, Frederick Shook, Dan Lattimore, and Laurie Lattimore-Volkmann, The Broadcast News Process, 7th ed. (Englewood, CO: Morton, 2005).
13. Gene Goodwin, “The Ethics of Compassion,” The Quill (November 1983), 38–40.