The five principles of ethical journalism, and why this lawyer disavows each one
I learned a thing or two about journalistic ethics as a beat reporter for the Brown University Daily Herald. Years later, on inspiration from Hunter S. Thompson and Tom Wolfe I took over and subverted the Boalt Hall Cross-Examiner to my own ends as an experiment in ethical relativism.
Specifically, I learned that they are self-important nonsense.
The Parable of the Bighorn Sheep
As you may know male sheep — rams — compete for dominance and female attention butting their heads against one another until one of them gives up.
These are rituals evolutionarily predetermined to ensure nobody gets butt-hurt. Unlike elephant seals or baboons, who murder each other. Call them the rules of sheep ethics.
Suppose you’re hiking up a mountain, confronted by a 350-pound stomping and snorting sheep. You have a can of bear spray that would repel the beast but that would be utterly not cricket from the sheep’s point of view.
Are you obliged to follow the sheep ethical rules? No, not even as a guest on their turf because you’re not a sheep.
Lawyer, not Journalist
I am not committed to a reporter’s ethics as a source, subject, or even contributor or publisher of news content because that’s not my job. My role is lawyer. That’s my guild and we have different and more complex rules.
- Truth and accuracy. Pffft. I practice honesty and personal integrity. But I have zero obligation to surface unknown facts, and may take strategic advantage of the ignorance of others.
- Independence. Nobody is independent. I represent a client. A journalist represents their publisher ‘s cultural and institutional biases.
- Fairness and impartiality. Really? Ethics is adherence to rules. Rules may be just but are rarely fair. They favor one person over another.
- Humanity. Do no harm to other people’s feelings. Sorry but there will be winners and losers.
- Accountability. The legal version requires holding yourself to an honest state of mind at the time a statement is made, usually not a duty to fact check or correct errors that come to light later.
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