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Current Event
On Saturday, April 26, the Society of Professional Journalists' Northern California chapter debates highly charged issues of wartime ethics for journalists. Wars put journalists in conflict with ourselves. We struggle over whether to report the truth unvarnished, even if it causes harm, or to accede to the government's attempts to control coverage in the name of patriotism or protection of our troops. Peter Sussman, former president of SPJ's Northern California chapter and co-author of "Committing Journalism," will review many of the ethical disputes that have arisen since the September 11 attacks. He will provoke audience members to address thorny and emotional issues of journalistic ethics. Issues such as: * Should journalists have defied government opposition and reported that Special Forces troops were on the ground in Afghanistan within weeks of the September 11 attacks? (Some newspapers reported the information; others withheld it.) * Should they have revealed the presence or location of American forces in Iraq long before the outbreak of hostilities? What about in Colombia or the Philippines? * Should they have accepted constraints on the airing of Bin Laden's taped messages, as the government asked? * Should the Wall Street Journal have shared with the government an al-Qaeda laptop that came into its possession? Should it have admitted in print that it did so? Could such actions have helped to put Journal reporter Daniel Pearl's life at risk? * Do American reporters have an obligation to minimize harm to Israelis or to Palestinians if they learn of an attack in advance? * Is American journalists' news coverage compromised when their selection and placement and the conditions of their reporting are controlled by military officers in units where they are "embedded"? What should they do about it? * In a war such as the open-ended and geographically vague "war on terrorism," what is war? What is the theater of conflict? And where are the limits on deference to government demands? "Ethics is concerned with what principled journalists agree we OUGHT to report or conceal, not what we or the government is required to do," Sussman said. "It is imperative that we reconsider how to make such complex decisions in times of new and ambiguous forms of warfare." Sussman, member of SPJ's national Ethics Committee and co-author of its Code of Ethics, has conducted several previous workshops on these hot-button issues. They have drawn robust audiences and sparked lively exchanges.
Join us for a stimulating, irritating or passionate discussion. Your call. SPJ Members $10, Non-members $12, Students $8. |
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Committees
Professional Development /Programs Excellence in Journalism Awards . |
