Cameron Stokes

Professor Alicia Nails

COM 5250

Due date: 4/13/2023

The Ethics of Journalism and Reporting

Journalism is essential in shaping public debate and informing citizens of events and issues affecting them directly. For journalists to do their work effectively, they must abide by strict ethical principles that guide and regulate their conduct. These standards ensure journalists uphold impartiality and independence, report accurately and fairly, and respect privacy and dignity in their reporting (St. Bonaventure University Online). Modern media's fast-paced and highly competitive nature has presented many challenges to these ethical standards. At times, ethical boundaries have been crossed, and public trust compromised. This paper will review what ethical standards journalists are expected to abide by, explore examples where ethical boundaries were crossed, and discuss transparency and accountability as it relates to ethical reporting. At the conclusion of our paper, it will be stressed that journalists must be transparent and accountable when reporting and using sources for their work. Unethical reporting can have devastating repercussions for journalists such as lawsuits, career termination, or damaged reputations.

Ethical Standards for Journalism

Journalists play an invaluable role in shaping public opinion and informing society. Journalists must abide by an ethics code guiding their behavior to fulfill their duties effectively. The Society of Professional Journalists has provided a code with four core values that journalists must abide by. These include truth, accuracy, independence, fairness/neutrality/minimizing harm, and compliance (SPJ). These values provide journalists with guidance in making decisions and controlling their conduct. Accuracy is a cornerstone of ethical journalism. Journalists must report the facts accurately and honestly while avoiding any errors or misrepresentations of facts. This responsibility includes checking facts, verifying sources, and correcting mistakes quickly. Fairness and neutrality are cornerstones of ethical journalism. Journalists must seek out and present viewpoints fairly while remaining impartial to avoid bias, prejudice, and personal opinions that might impact how stories are told. Journalists must strive for balance and objectivity in their reporting; sensationalizing or exaggerating to gain more readers would further degrade ethical journalism standards.

Ethical reporting stems from the role journalists play in society. Journalists must hold power accountable and serve as watchdogs on behalf of the public, acting as advocates for marginalized or oppressed communities through their reports that influence public opinion - this gives journalists tremendous power that should be exercised responsibly and ethically. Journalists' ethical standards aim to ensure accurate and fair reporting while respecting their subjects' privacy, dignity, and rights. Such standards play a pivotal role in maintaining public trust in journalism as an invaluable aspect of society. Journalists adhering to such ethical standards may produce high-quality reporting that informs the community while avoiding potential negative repercussions caused by unethical reporting practices.

Violations of Ethical Journalism

Recently, several high-profile cases have occurred where journalists crossed ethical boundaries while reporting. Claas relotius is one such example. He was fired by Der Spiegel, a German news magazine, in 2018 after it became known that he fabricated many elements in the stories he wrote for the publication (New York Times). His reporting included inventing events, people, and even entire...