CHAPTER 20 Ethics
Overview
No doubt you understand the importance of introducing students to the ethical problems
facing journalists. This chapter is designed to help you do so. It begins with a discussion of
Then it covers three important ethical
philosophies the ethics of duty, the ethics of final ends or consequences, and situation
Teaching Tips
When we first proposed this book, we placed the discussion of ethics among the beginning
chapters to demonstrate how important we thought it was. The plan proved to be impractical.
Until students have had some exposure to journalism and the kinds of stories journalists do, it
equally impractical and pedagogically unsound to wait until the course is nearly over to
introduce this chapter. In our sample
suggest introducing this chapter about halfway through a 14-week course.
principled reasoning, everyone benefits the students, the field of journalism and, ultimately,
society itself.
Lecture Notes
I. INTRODUCTION
A. Recent ethical challenges that journalists and their employers have faced illustrate the
need to develop ethical decision-making skills in journalism today.
II. THE PUBLIC PERCEPTION OF JOURNALISM ETHICS
A.
B. Bloggers as watchdogs bloggers and others calling attention to journalistic
irregularities.
C. Journalism codes of ethics.
1. No mandatory and enforced code because of fears of infringement on freedom of
the press.
2. Many associations and news organizations have ethical codes that are enforced.
3. Journalists must set limits on their own conduct, or government eventually will do
so for them.
III. THREE ETHICAL PHILOSOPHIES
A. The ethics of duty absolutist/legalist.
1. We have a duty to do what is right; some actions are always right or always wrong;
the end never justifies the means.
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2. We must discover the rules a
imperative.
3. For many, religious beliefs are foundational.
4.
B. The ethics of final ends or consequences relativist.
1.
ethical; intentions matter.
C. Situation ethics: the ethics of specific acts somewhere in between relative and
1. No moral absolutes only principle is to judge each ethical problem on its own
merits.
2. Love of neighbor
people always come first; sometimes the choice is between love for one person and
love for a larger community.
IV. RESOLVING ETHICAL ISSUES
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A. Ethical reasoning (except for the ethics of duty) requires principled reasoning.
B. nts:
1. Appraising the situation know all the facts; neglecting to report the facts or do any
real reporting can result in great embarrassment for the media.
2. Identifying values personal values, news organization values, community values,
national values; journalistic independence.
3. Appealing to ethical principles ; expedience is
rarely a good ethical principle.
V. ETHICAL PROBLEMS FOR JOURNALISTS
A. Deceit those who subscribe to ethics of duty
certain criteria are met.
B. Conflicts of interest they can crop up anywhere.
1. Friendship perhaps greatest obstacle to flow of information; stories about
acquaintances should be assigned to someone else.
2. Payola no payment (other than from the employer) for stories; avoid doing
promotional work for people you cover; bloggers are not exempt and should be
wary of requests to give favorable coverage or to advertise.
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4. Checkbook journalism legitimate news professionals can be cut off from sources
who expect to be paid; good journalism demands that you pay only when there are
no other means to get a story and you can get corroboration.
5. Participation in the news.
C. Advertising pressure
influence of advertisers; ads are going on front pages.
D. appropriateness of ticketed journalism
-style conversations.
E. Invasion of privacy the right to know; hacking into email for a story.
1. Crime victims news agencies cannot be punished for publishing lawfully obtained
2. Juvenile offenders courts have upheld the right to publish their names.
3. Victims of child abuse and their families.
4. Sexual orientation.
5. Public figures and their children; private email is off-limits, but what about
corporate intranets?
6. Photos and video sensitive images; photo manipulation.
F. Withholding information cutting deals to withhold information is dangerous.
G. Incorrect and incomplete information correction vs. updating; online linking to
source data.
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VI. PLAGIARISM
A. The problem is the definition; be rigorous in attributing direct and paraphrased quotes.
B.
.
VII. SOCIAL MEDIA ETHICS
A. News appears not just on news organization websites, but also on social media like
Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Snapchat.
B. All guidelines of journalism ethics apply to journalistic use of social media.
Class Activities and Discussion Questions
Activity 1: Put your students in five small groups, and assign each group one of the
following scenarios. Ask each group to prepare a brief presentation to give to the rest of the
class. The scenarios:
For a story about abortion trends, a 16-year-old female source has admitted that she had
an abortion as a 14-year–
part because she wants to hurt her parents, with whom she does not get along. Should
You are working on a story about a local factory that is struggling to stay afloat, and you
conduct an interview with a line worker who is critical of his bosses and the company.
When you return to the office, the worker calls and asks that you not print his comments
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because he is afraid he will be fired if you do. He knows the comments were on the
For a story about teenage pregnancy, a teenage mother now an 18-year-old high school
graduate
name in the story and is officially denying paternity. Should you print his name? What
should the reporter an
A public transit bus driver in your community has been fired for leaving the bus to, in his
-of-control adult at a
bus stop. The reason for the firing? Leaving the bus even to protect a 10-year-old child
from being physically assaulted was a violation of transit district policy. You are
investigating the story and have interviewed the driver, but transit officials are not
A reporter has learned, on the eve of the pla –
caliber high school football team was involved in serious incidents of hazing during the
preseason overnight football camp held on campus before school started weeks earlier.
The hazing included beating younger players with tennis balls in socks, forcing younger
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How important should the timeliness element be in this ethical analysis? What else
should the reporter and e
In all of these scenarios, your classroom discussions will be more satisfying if everyone has
at least a basic understanding of the ethics of duty, the ethics of final ends or consequences,
and situation ethics. Remember that, in most circumstances, subscribers to the ethics of duty
Activity 2: After each group has made its presentation for activity 1, ask the other groups to
use the Potter Box to determine the journalistically ethical response. Discussion questions:
Activity 3: For each of the scenarios in activity 1, ask groups of students to describe how
those who follow the ethics of duty, the ethics of final ends or consequences, and situation
ethics would make their decisions about how to handle the situation. Discussion questions:
you
subscribe to the ethics of duty, the ethics of final ends or situation ethics? Why?
Activity 4: In a computer lab with Internet access, have students go to the Poynter Online
discussion of the firing of Los Angeles Times photographer Brian Walski
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Poynter story and the Los Angeles Times
Internet search for other examples of altered news photos. (Here are some examples you
might suggest students look for: the photo of the Kent State shootings in which a fencepost
directly behind a screaming Mary Ann Vecchio was removed by LIFE magazine editors; the
Time critics said it was done to
make him appear more menacing; a University of Wisconsin publication that inserted an
African-American student into an image to try to present a more diverse student body; and
Activity 5: Have students navigate to the Poynter Online site (www.poynter.org), search for
different newspapers. After
noting similarities and differences in the different sets of guidelines, have pairs of students
create their own set of photo guidelines and make a brief presentation to the rest of the class.
As part of their presentation, students should address the philosophical underpinnings of their
Solutions to Textbook Exercises
1. The purpose of this exercise is for students to discover how attitudes on these issues have
not only changed, but have changed quickly. Journalists almost universally were opposed
to publishing the names of juvenile criminal suspects and defendants and victims of rape
and other sex crimes in the past, while policies regarding the outing of gays and lesbians
has yet to reach a consensus. The real benefit of the assignment will come from the
2. Student responses should focus on clear and coherent
whether the examples students cite are journalism-based.
3. Even absolutists have a problem here. If as journalists they believe that it is their duty to
report the news regardless, they would run the story. If they believe that the protection of
4. Absolutists might conclude that any acceptance of a freebie is unethical. Adherents to the
ethics of final ends might argue that readers are better served by the reporting of such a
travel story. If it were the only way the news organization could afford to cover it, the
acceptance of a free trip might be ethical. It might become more acceptable if the writer
informed the public that he or she accepted the free trip. Situationists would apply similar
thinking.
exhausted all other alternatives? Are the news media the only means of correcting the
situation? Will the editor give full disclosure of the deception and the reason for it? What
will be the impact on the credibility of the paper?
unethical. In commenting on these blogs, you might challenge students to argue for the
opposite perspective, even if they shared their classmates perspective in their own post.
Solutions to Workbook Exercises
1.
well have been wrong, but many people perform unethical acts and feel perfectly good
about them. Ethical decisions should be based on principled reasoning. It is reason that
separates humans from other creatures, and we must use it.
2. First, try not to laugh, and then be patient. Ask how he or she defines journalists. Tabloids
have always been with us, but those who work for them are not true journalists. In the
3. Professional societies of journalists do have codes of ethics, but most people argue that
they are too general to be useful. In addition, they are unenforceable. The danger of
enforceable ethical codes is that they fly in the face of the First Amendment, and plaintiffs
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can use them in court against reporters who violate them. However, the existing codes of
ethics do provide excellent guidelines for acceptable journalistic practice.
4. The point of this exercise is to help students consider whether ethics codes are
5. Most students will agree that their news organization should have a code of ethics. Such a
code may set limits and guidelines that should help journalists form their own set of
standards. The more difficult question is one of enforcement. Some news organizations
6. a.
The situation is essentially the same.
b. Subscribers to the ethics of duty would do the story. People should know that they are
in danger, and they should know how the police are responding. There are other
7. It would be misleading an
in the workbook. Point out to students that there are no clear answers. What these cases
demand is ethical or principled reasoning, and using the Potter Box enables students to do
that.
Students may object to this whole process. We have heard them say that people can
Depending on the ethical principles they choose, students may come to different
conclusions. Unless you subscribe to the ethics of duty, that is inevitable. Nothing forces
everyone to reach the same conclusion using those principles.
Remind students that principled reasoning never stops. They will bring one decision
into another, they will reconsider, and they will even change their minds.
Ethical decision-making gets easier and faster with practice. As we acquire any habit,
good or bad, virtue or vice, that habit becomes easy and natural.
When discussing the Potter Box with students, remind them that they can fill out the
boxes in any order. The boxes serve only to give structure to the reasoning process.
various ethical situations outlined in this exercise might be solved. We leave it to you and
to your students to wrestle your way in and around the box.
a. Situation: Do some more reporting. How close are we to elections? How serious are
these charges? How reliable are the sources?
Principles:
(1) the heartbeat of the ethics of duty would demand
prove the facts beyond a shadow of a doubt.
(3) On the one hand, the ethics of final ends or consequences might demand that the
greatest good for the greatest number means you publish the story. And what if the
(4) Running the names of those who asked to be anonymous would be an ethical
violation for most journalists except for situational ethicists and for those who
think anything is legitimate for the sake of a good story.
a vendetta against the candidate, too much harm is done to everyone. You need some
verifiable information and a couple of sources who will go on the record.
9. This extension of exercise 8 allows students to analyze more deeply ethical decisions
made by other journalists and editors.
10. Good ethical practice demands that you credit the original source of the quotations.
Moreover, copyright also demands it; you may get into trouble with the law if you do not
CHALLENGE EXERCISES
11. Students will find that reading codes of ethics can be instructive, both for the specific
content and for all of the vague statements they will find. In this exercise, students will
gather information that will help them set up their own codes of ethics. In the end, that is
the only way a person can be ethical.
12. Students will have no difficulty finding stories about ethical breaches by journalists. The
most common ethical challenge for journalists is probably plagiarism, and the number of
journalists across the country who are fired or disciplined for it every year seems to be