A reply to:
“We know there is a vast morass of information out there that our audiences want us to try to make sense of. The danger consists in trying to leap above it, not by getting more dramatic or salient or verifiable facts, but by analyzing, speculating, predicting, interpreting – by drawing definitive conclusions while the bodies are still warm.” Paul Knox, The Globe and Mail
In today’s Internet age, most people have easy access to as much information as they want (or don’t want) to absorb. You can read world-renowned newspapers views on events and stories, or read (or watch) everyday people’s opinions on the same story, most of which (that I’ve seen) don’t feel obliged to stay on the fence of a subject, a lot of the time simply descending into slagging matches if a commenter opposes their views. As bloggers and citizen journalists begin to find stories (and rumours) and run with them, without any training of an ethical journalistic standpoint, facts are becoming lost in the rush as the newsrooms try to get the information out first.
I’m not saying this happens all the time, and I’m not criticizing citizen journalism, which often does a good job of putting a different, sometimes more human, angle on a story or event.
But when (supposedly) reliable media outlets begin publishing information while having no idea whether it’s true or not, but publish it anyway to gain more readers and higher sales – this can bring the whole industry into a state of disgrace. A recent (and ongoing) example of this has ironically been brought into the headlines by the Madeline McCann case.
For anyone that doesn’t know the case, a young girl days short of her fourth birthday was abducted from an apartment while on holiday in Portugal, in May last year. Her parents said that they had left her with her two-year-old twin siblings while they ate at a restaurant about 120 metres away. After investigation by the Portuguese police, there seemed to be strong evidence that Madeline may not have been abducted at all, but may have died in the room. Meanwhile many possible sightings flooded in to support websites and news organisations.
Her parents, Gerry and Kate McCann, stated they didn’t want to leave Portugal until their daughter was found. But after an initial suspect was found, the police began to name the parents as suspects. In the end, the McCanns flew back to England in September, five months after the incident. Cue bedlam from the British media, who were waiting at the airport to watch the plane come in, and follow them back to their home. Fast forward to just last week, when four newspapers (from a single group) published front page apologies to the McCanns, after begin sued for publishing more than 100 articles claiming that the parents played a part in the disappearance of their daughter.
Personally (and I’m falling off the fence here, how I’m going to be a journalist I’ll never know), I think this is nothing short of a disgrace. For four (four!) national papers to underlie their reports with innuendo shows the length that the media can go to to gain a foothold in the sales game. These articles have (shock horror) been unscrupulously placed just to sell newspapers. Nothing more, nothing less. Of course, this is only four papers, but the damage has been done – journalists, and the British media in general, are now virtually labeled as liars.
Although the story has barely had any impact in North America, I think it’s an ongoing example that should remind us to check your facts (and names, and everything else we’ve been taught) before publishing it.
We’re (potentially) the ones that will be giving the public their information, whichever medium we end up in. In this age when there’s more information flying about quicker than ever before, we need to remember that the facts are the only bit that matter, and however you choose to interpret them, they still need to be there.
Some links –
http://www.gairrhydd.com/media/844/a-deceiving-web/
http://www.vernoncoleman.com/mccann.htm
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070512061804AAEUIiW
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/03/19/nmccann319.xml
http://truecrimemagazine.com/articles/399
