Law, Ethics, and Journalism

     When one thinks about laws and ethics, it may seem natural to think that they are the same thing. They are not. Instead, they are separate ideas that are like two sides of the same coin. Laws come from the idea of what people do, based on rules codified in constitutions, statutes, common practice, et cetera (Moore & Murray, 2012). On the other hand, ethics are based on “ought talk”, or “what is good, both for the individual and society” (Patterson & Wilkins, 2014, p. 4). In other words, laws are rules that govern what people actually do, while ethics look at what people should do. When it comes to digital media, sometimes an action can be both legal and ethical, sometimes it can be one but not the other. That is the biggest difference between law and ethics: the law (usually) is pretty clear, ethics are not so clear.

     An example of a situation where law and ethics combine is the case of Boston Herald photographer Stanley Forman. In the process of photographing a story of a fire, he took pictures of two girls falling from a collapsing fire escape, seconds before they would have been rescued. One died (Patterson & Wilkins, 2014). It was legal for the paper to publish the story; freedom of the press allows for the publication because it was part of the news story. Also, according to Moore and Murray (2012), two aspects of the media are agenda setting and to be a watchdog. As a result of this story, the city of Boston very quickly changed the way fire escapes are inspected, and this improved the safety of the city. The question is if it was ethical. Yes, it was. Even though the paper made money off of the photograph, and the photographer won the Pulitzer Prize, the greater society is safer as a result; more lives were saved.

     Law and ethics also diverge. Moore and Murray (2012) reports on a situation in which a female reporter began dating the mayor of Los Angeles. The mayor’s marriage subsequently ended, and the reporter filed stories on the breakup without making it clear that she was dating the mayor. While it was technically legal for them to date, and for the reporter to withhold information on her relationship with the mayor, it was not ethical.  As people, they were both being unethical as he was a married man, and she was dating a man she knew was married. It was also unethical for her to not disclose their relationship while reporting on his marriage.

     This is why law and ethics are important for media professionals. One has to report the story, but one has to do it in a way that is ethical. The reporter discussed above didn’t want to lose her job (although she ultimately did), so she was looking out for herself. The Code of Ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) states that “Ethical journalism means taking responsibility for one’s work and explaining one’s decisions to the public” (SPJ, n.d.). She did not do this. This ethical statement is one of the most important in media. The law is just as important because without the constitution, there would be no freedom of the press. In the end, while law and ethics are not the same thing, they work together to guide the media into making ethical and legal decisions. From all sources of law, there are rules that are guideposts for the media-not just the First Amendment, but also, for example, in administrative law, such as rules laid out by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) as to which frequencies a particular media outlet may use for radio and television. Ethics come into play concerning more personal decisions as to how to do the job, such as the SPJ code of ethics.

References

Moore, R.L. and Murray, M.D. (2012). Media Law and Ethics. 4^th Ed. New York: Routledge.

Patterson, P. and Wilkins, L. (2014). Media Ethics: Issues and Cases. 8^th Ed. New York: McGraw-Hill

Society of Professional Journalists. (n.d). Code of Ethics. Retrieved from: https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp