CBS and the Code of Ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists [demand a CBS reprimand!]

Society of Professional Journalists ^ | 1996 | Society of Professional Journalists

[Bonaparte]

Code of Ethics

Preamble

Members of the Society of Professional Journalists believe that public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues. Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist's credibility. Members of the Society share a dedication to ethical behavior and adopt this code to declare the Society's principles and standards of practice.

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Seek Truth and Report It

Journalists should be honest, fair and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting information.

Journalists should:

• Test the accuracy of information from all sources and exercise care to avoid inadvertent error. Deliberate distortion is never permissible.
• Diligently seek out subjects of news stories to give them the opportunity to respond to allegations of wrongdoing.
• Identify sources whenever feasible. The public is entitled to as much information as possible on sources' reliability.
• Always question sources’ motives before promising anonymity. Clarify conditions attached to any promise made in exchange for information. Keep promises.
• Make certain that headlines, news teases and promotional material, photos, video, audio, graphics, sound bites and quotations do not misrepresent. They should not oversimplify or highlight incidents out of context.
• Never distort the content of news photos or video. Image enhancement for technical clarity is always permissible. Label montages and photo illustrations.
• Avoid misleading re-enactments or staged news events. If re-enactment is necessary to tell a story, label it.
• Avoid undercover or other surreptitious methods of gathering information except when traditional open methods will not yield information vital to the public. Use of such methods should be explained as part of the story
• Never plagiarize.
• Tell the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience boldly, even when it is unpopular to do so.
• Examine their own cultural values and avoid imposing those values on others.
• Avoid stereotyping by race, gender, age, religion, ethnicity, geography, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance or social status.
• Support the open exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.
• Give voice to the voiceless; official and unofficial sources of information can be equally valid.
• Distinguish between advocacy and news reporting. Analysis and commentary should be labeled and not misrepresent fact or context.
• Distinguish news from advertising and shun hybrids that blur the lines between the two.
• Recognize a special obligation to ensure that the public's business is conducted in the open and that government records are open to inspection.

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Minimize Harm

Ethical journalists treat sources, subjects and colleagues as human beings deserving of respect.

Journalists should:

• Show compassion for those who may be affected adversely by news coverage. Use special sensitivity when dealing with children and inexperienced sources or subjects.
• Be sensitive when seeking or using interviews or photographs of those affected by tragedy or grief.
• Recognize that gathering and reporting information may cause harm or discomfort. Pursuit of the news is not a license for arrogance.
• Recognize that private people have a greater right to control information about themselves than do public officials and others who seek power, influence or attention. Only an overriding public need can justify intrusion into anyone’s privacy.
• Show good taste. Avoid pandering to lurid curiosity.
• Be cautious about identifying juvenile suspects or victims of sex crimes.
• Be judicious about naming criminal suspects before the formal filing of charges.
• Balance a criminal suspect’s fair trial rights with the public’s right to be informed.

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Act Independently

Journalists should be free of obligation to any interest other than the public's right to know.

Journalists should:

• Avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived.
• Remain free of associations and activities that may compromise integrity or damage credibility.
• Refuse gifts, favors, fees, free travel and special treatment, and shun secondary employment, political involvement, public office and service in community organizations if they compromise journalistic integrity.
• Disclose unavoidable conflicts.
• Be vigilant and courageous about holding those with power accountable.
• Deny favored treatment to advertisers and special interests and resist their pressure to influence news coverage.
• Be wary of sources offering information for favors or money; avoid bidding for news.

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Be Accountable

Journalists are accountable to their readers, listeners, viewers and each other.

Journalists should:

• Clarify and explain news coverage and invite dialogue with the public over journalistic conduct.
• Encourage the public to voice grievances against the news media.
• Admit mistakes and correct them promptly.
• Expose unethical practices of journalists and the news media.
• Abide by the same high standards to which they hold others.

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The SPJ Code of Ethics is voluntarily embraced by thousands of
writers, editors and other news professionals. The present version of
the code was adopted by the 1996 SPJ National Convention, after months
of study and debate among the Society's members.

Sigma Delta Chi's first Code of Ethics was borrowed from the
American Society of Newspaper Editors in 1926. In 1973, Sigma Delta Chi
wrote its own code, which was revised in 1984, 1987 and 1996.
 

[Bonaparte]

It's time for the Society of Professional Journalists to take some responsibility for their "self-regulating" profession. CBS subscribes to the SPJ Code of Ethics, at least, in word if not deed. It is no exaggeration that for decades, CBS has grossly violated numerous strictures of the Code. The network has now stepped so far over the ethical line that nothing less than a severe public reprimand from SPJ will do.

[Bonaparte]

Contact Them! Demand they put up or shut up!

[Bonaparte]

just a heads up

[landerwy]

They have a code of ethics?????? LOL

[MisterRepublican]

Isn't the Society of Professional Journalists a parody website?

[Bonaparte]

Time to see what SPJ is made of. I intend to demand a full and detailed public reprimand of CBS from them. It's not just the "credibility" of CBS that is on the line here.

[Bonaparte]

If they fail to reprimand Rather and CBS, they may very soon be just that.

Forwarding this thread to Media Research Center.

[Colofornian]

Isn't the Society of Professional Journalists a parody website?

LOL

[Bonaparte]

ping

[Bonaparte]

ping

[Penny]

DONE!!! THANK YOU for the time and effort you have spent on this vital and cogent post--and contact info.
Best regards . . . Penny

[Bonaparte]

Thankyou Penny! All the e's I sent them were returned to me as undeliverable. I'm going to phone them and, if necessary, write to them.

I'm also looking into the National Association of Broadcasters and what their stance and intentions are concerning this renegade network and anchor man. I have yet to find a Code of Ethics posted at NAB's website.

We must spare no effort to hold Rather and CBS fully accountable for their betrayal of their profession's canons of ethics, as well as their betrayl of the American public.

[Bonaparte]

One of my e's finally got through to SPJ. Here it is with reply and further request for information. (Read from bottom email to top email)...

Thankyou so much for your speedy response. And thankyou for your forthright public statement as reported in the Washington Times. I have followed this story closely since its eruption and compared what I've read of Dan Rather's behavior to each point of the Code. His ethical breeches are simply too numerous to itemize in an email and, in my opinion, Mr. Rather bears little resemblance to a journalist.

I would like to contact the National Association of Broadcasters as well. However, I have failed to find a Code of Ethics posted at their website. Do you happen to know if they have one? Also, can you suggest other like professional organizations that may profitably be queried on this issue?

Much appreciation for whatever information you can supply.

----Original Message Follows----
From: "Gail Kiles"
To: "Fred Garfield"
Subject: RE: Is SPJ MIA?
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 2004 17:19:17 -0500

Please refer to the following story:

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040921-121159-1861r.htm

Bests,
Gail Kiles

Assistant Programs Director
Society of Professional Journalists
Phone: (317) 927-8000 x204
Fax: (317) 920-4789

-----Original Message-----
From: Bonaparte
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 2004 5:12 PM
To: Gail Kiles
Subject: Is SPJ MIA?

To whom it may concern:

I have searched the news and your website in vain for some public statement from your organization concerning the shoddy and unethical journalism of Mr. Dan Rather and CBS network's news division. If I've simply missed it, I trust you will be kind enough to direct me to it. I have read SPJ's statement of mission and its Code of Ethics. It couldn't be more clear that this network and its news anchor are in gross violation of numerous points of that code.

Your Code of Ethics is an excellent one. I'm just wondering how seriously it is taken.

Respectfully,

[Paleo Conservative]

Viacom owner of C^BS: MTV Running Ad Saying Kids Will Be Drafted!!"

[Bonaparte]

Excellent PC! Let's escalate this attack to include all of the Viacom empire! Very nice display, btw! :-))

[Bonaparte]

Check out the new tag!

[antceecee]

"They have a code of ethics?????? LOL"

They use to call it 'yellow journalism', now they just piss all over everything and call it 'fair and balanced' reporting.

The following is excerpted from: Effects of the Press on Spanish-American Relations in 1898 By John Baker

"Yellow" Journalism

As newspapers began to compete more and more with one another to increase circulation and obtain more advertising revenue, a different type of journalism was developed by publishers Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst.

In the mid-1890s, Pulitzer (in the New York World) and Hearst (in the San Francisco Examiner and later the New York Morning Journal) transformed newspapers with sensational and scandalous news coverage, the use of drawings and the inclusion of more features such as comic strips.

After Pulitzer began publishing color comic sections that included a strip entitled "The Yellow Kid" (right) in early 1896, this type of paper was labeled "yellow journalism." Drawn by R.F. Outcault, the popular (if now-unfunny) strip became a prize in the struggle between Pulitzer and Hearst in the New York newspaper wars. Outcault moved the strip to Hearst's papers after nine months, where it competed with a Pulitzer-sponsored version of itself.

"The Yellow Kid" proved the first merchandising phenomenon of the comics. The character was portrayed in keychains and collector cards, appeared on stage and even had a short-lived magazine named after him.

The papers themselves trumpeted their concern for the "people." At the same time, yellow journalists choked up the news channels on which the common people depended with shrieking, gaudy, sensation-loving, devil-may-care kinds of journalism. This turned the high drama of life into a cheap melodrama and led to stories being twisted into the forms best suited for sales by the hollering newsboy.

From: "Newspapers," Microsoft Encarta 97 Encyclopedia. © 1993-1996 Microsoft Corporation; "Readings in Journalism History," Fall 1994: Compiled by Erna Smith, San Francisco State University. Chap 9: "The New Journalism"; and, "100 Years of American Newspaper Comics" by Maurice Horn, © 1996 Random House Publishing.



John Baker's Website: http://www.humboldt.edu/~jcb10/

[KingNo155]

If a Source cannot be identified then it can't be trusted! In America One has the right to face his accuser!

[Bonaparte]

Absolutely! Beware of so-called "journalists" who hide their sources, whose favorite sources always have names like "unidentified," "prefers to remain anonymous," or "a high ranking member."