Graphic graphics

I found this assignment to be difficult.  Ethics is a tricky subject, especially when there isn't a set rubric to follow.  

1.) Would you run these photos?

2.) What criteria did you use to make a decision?

3.) Under what circumstances would you run the photos?

4.) Would your decision be different if the events were local?

5.) Does where or how you play the photo have any bearing in your decision?

6.) With which photo did you struggle the most?  Why?

A boy and his dog

I would not run this photo.  It is undoubtedly a good picture and it captures the raw emotion of the scene, but I cannot think of a circumstance where it would be news-worthy or contribute to a story.  The pain shown in the face of the boy is something most have felt or can at least imagine.  Thus, I don't think readers would gain much from seeing the picture, but I can't see that ever happening.  If there were a strong calling for the use of this picture, I think it could be printed.  My decision would not be affected by the location of the publication. 

Rescue worker consoling a family

I would not run this photo under any circumstance.  To run this picture would be far too intrusive to the family and to show the dead child would be too graphic for nearly any publication.  Again, I cannot think of a time when there would be a strong enough need for this picture to be run, although I would have too many reservation about publishing it to do so.  If the story were local, I would not run this picture, as a higher percentage of readers would know the subjects and it would again be very intrusive.  Out of respect for the family, this photo should never be run.

Bud Dwyer

I would consider running this picture, although if it is part of a series, I might choose to print a picture taken earlier in the sequence.  Since Dwyer is a public figure and the circumstances regarding his suicide are of public interest, the story is more news-worthy and there is a stronger public right to know (In Pennsylvania, at least).  The fact that the bullet is in his head makes it a tough call, too.  I would only consider running the picture in Pennsylvania, but I don't know if readers would really gain from seeing it, as one could easily imagine what this scene would look like.  I struggled with this decision the most, as I don't know what the proper judgement is regarding whether or not pictures of dead people should be run and I don't know whether Dwyer is still alive or not.

Printing plant

I wouldn't run this picture.  I feel it's too graphic to print and that to do so would be disrespectful to the family.  It's not the place of the media to exploit the emotions behind death and that while the plant shooting is newsworthy, this picture doesn't help tell the story beyond the fact that this is what a dead person look like.  Location of the publication would not influence my decision, as I would not run the picture.

Boy on fence

I also had a lot of trouble with this picture.  I don't think I'd run it due to the strong shock value it carries.  Still, the boy survives and it is surely an interesting story.  In this case, I think the picture would help carry the story.  In fact, the picture and this cutline are all I would really have to see.  To run this story without the graphic would not be as effective.  Still, I don't know how news-worthy this picture is beyond being interesting, so I don't know if  its publication could be justified.  To print this picture wouldn't be intrusive to the boy, so I don't think the location of the publication would influence my decision.  After getting over my initial shock to the picture, I was able to look at it comfortably and I think that most readers could also gain this level of comfort after spending some time with it.

Mardi Gras

I would not run this picture.  It is far too intrusive to the girl, even though her face is blurred.  Also, I do not know how I would feel about running it with the faces of all who were involved.  Is it far that only half of the spectators can be identified?  This is evidence of a serious crime, yet only half of those present could face consequences as a result of this picture being published.  There is no doubt that all involved should face the consequences, but I don't think it would be fair to punish only half of them.  This picture is also too graphic to print.  While it is "censored," the scene is too raw and adult in content to publish, regardless of location.  I don't think there would be a need to run the picture, either.  It's an easy scene to picture and I don't think the reader would benefit enough from this picture to justify it being printed.

Just when I thought making progress in a story would allow me more free time to take a break from academic work, my plan has backfired. For JOUR 480, literary feature writing with Walt Harrington, I am covering a woman named Loretta Dessen, better known as "The Chex Mix Lady" who hosts events and "barn dances" on her property in Urbana. While I have already written a short profile on Dessen and barn dances for a class (never published), I have chosen to approach her story with greater depth and focus more on her interaction with the college kids she hosts (usually several hundred drunk students, four nights a week).

I have already spent many hours with Dessen following and interacting with her and her friends. I have also spent some of the longest hours of my journalism career shadowing her as she hosted two barn dances simultaneously for Greek houses in which I have many friends. It was difficult to focus on Dessen and hear her comments while my friends were drunkenly hassling me throughout the night.

To get back to the point, I have spent lots of time with my subject and I believe that I have reached a point and level of comfort where I can ask nearly any question. This includes several personal questions about the loneliness of being a widow.

I feel that I have made great progress with my reporting and can now afford to take a little time off, catch up with friends and maybe attend my fraternity's barn dance tonight and then go to a friend's tomorrow.

Or not.

After much thought and resistance of peer pressure, I have decided not to attend either event. While I know I could behave properly at the barn dances, I don't want to risk any association to any misbehaviour (of which there is usually plenty) and have it hinder the progress I have made with my subject. Maybe I'm just being lazy and don't want to deal with finding a cowboy hat or a date, but I feel that I'm making the right choice about handling this conflict of interest. Perhaps I am making the proper ethical decision to remove myself from the scene and remain "the fly on the wall," observing with Dessen and not becoming one of her patrons she interacts with.

Catch of my lifetime

While it is impossible to know what errors I will catch later in my life, the one I made today might be tough to beat. It's not so much the mistake that was made that makes my catch noteworthy. My catch wins "catch of my lifetime" due to fact that I caught an error by Andy Schotz, the SPJ Ethics Committee Chair, in his article reviewing ethics and poor journalism during the past year. The irony made me chuckle.

As I neared the end of the Schotz article we read in class this morning, "Journalism Ethics: Year in Review," I spotted an error. In the fourteenth paragraph, Pat Tillman is wrongly described as an "Iraq war casualty." Tillman died in Afghanistan.

His response to my email was professional and brief:

No, you are the first.

And you are correct.

Thanks for being a careful reader and for letting me know.

I'll ask that we post a correction.

-Andy Schotz

...

I found another mistake while walking home from the media lab tonight. While it's not in the running for "catch of my lifetime," it's surely one of my favorite errors to spot and has been at the top of my list ever since I learned of it in JOUR 400 with Jeff Unger.

There is a chalkboard outside of Illini Media advertising their "First Annual Super Raffle." Do you see the error?

If it is the first raffle they are holding, it cannot be the "first annual," even if they are planning on holding raffles in years to come.

Finding a different angle

If you turned on the television this past weekend, odds are you noticed that Hurricane Ike was being covered by every major news outlet.  This is understandable, of course, as the country was holding its breath and waiting to see if the citizens of Galveston who decided to ride out the storm would ultimately face the forewarned "certain death."  Every station had their anchors seeing who could get closer to the seawall without washing away as Ike crept toward Texas and it seemed as if each reported was positioned several yards down the shore from each other. (By the way, FOX's Geraldo Rivera wins the prize.)  As I flipped through the channels Friday evening, the stories didn't change and I soon grew tired of waiting for Ike to make landfall.

Later in the night one of my roommates, who had been drinking throughout the night, began complaining about one of the stations reporting about a town mayor that was displeased with evacuation efforts and got personally involved in the process.  My roommate didn't like how a "happy" story was being reported in a time of crisis and began criticizing media outlets for being ratings-driven.  Granted that he was drunk and not making enough sense to hold a civil argument about the matter, he still brought up two very good points.

Yes, the purpose of a media outlet is to make money.  While I think many people fail to realize this, it's the truth.  This being said, how can one news source work to get better ratings that its competition when everyone is covering the same story?  The answer is simple: find a different angle.

I thought it was great that this one station (sadly, I can't recall which one) took time to report something other than the impending hurricane and how much damage it had the potential to cause.  Every story has different angles and at a time when every station was dealing with numbers of people in the thousands who were evacuating or would be without power, it was nice to have a story focus on one individual and his efforts to make a difference in such a trying time.  It was a welcomed break from all the weather maps and rainfall charts, and I hope to see other news outlets try taking different angles in the future.

Let it be known: I did not cry when Barack Obama spoke in '04

While, I did not shed a single tear, I was impressed with his speech.  More specifically, I was impressed with his orating skills, not the content.  His delivery was smooth, articulate, and led me to predict that he would at least be a viable candidate for the Democratic ticket.

Now that I have given Senator Obama some of his due credit, I hope those of you who are reading this remember the title of this post before you make outlandish comments and assume every member of this campus is a democrat, liberal, Obama supporter, etc.  I am none of these.  I am a fiscal conservative who identifies with the GOP and occasionally shifts to the middle on certain issues.  I also spent the spring semester working for a Republican senator in Washington.  I feel it is important for you to know my relative positioning so that you can better judge what I say and understand how I analyze information.

As we discussed in class, it is important to understand how bias, especially of the political variety, can influence the way news is covered and disseminated.  We must also be aware of our own bias when reporting and analyzing the news, as we can subconsciously allow our viewpoints to skew our work and judgment.

This really comes into play around elections.  With the political media creating so much hype around every move made by a candidate, it is common to become wary of one news outlet or another.  This can be good, as is it nearly impossible for a source to be completely objective.

Skepticism towards the political media can also have a negative influence, too.  It is true that some outlets may tend to lean one way or another, but their news should not be immediately or completely discredited.  When I was in Washington, I did press work for the senator and consumed news from over 20 sources on a daily basis.  While I had my preconceived opinions of news outlets, some of which turned out to be true, I was also surprised to find how similar much of the information was.

Journalists, despite their opinions, can only bend a story so far from the truth before it become farce.  The bulk of the bias comes out in how the story is covered-- which facts are used and which are left out.  Space and time limitations make it difficult for all sides and facts of a story to be included, although the journalist has the ethical responsibility to represent all sides as fairly as possible.  This makes it important to "shop around" while getting news and get multiple sources for each story.  Hearing multiple angles of a story enables consumers to get a more balanced account of what happened.  Hopefully they will then be able to combat their own bias and make a fair analysis of the news.

It is important to understand bias and how it can influence both the dissemination and reception of news.  As journalists, we have the challenge of not letting our personal opinions tarnish our attempts to objectively report the truth or lead our analysis astray.

As for making false sweeping generalizations in the classroom, I'll let that slide.  Just know that when we're out there in the professional world, we'll be expected to be as fair as possible.

Those who defect will answer to Vice President Palin.

The title of this blog says it all. I'd rather be skiing. Again, not to knock journalism or U of I, it's just my favorite thing to do. I spent Labor Day at a ski lake in Farmer City helping with the Illinois Water Ski Team's tryouts (yes, we have a team). Even though current team members didn't get a set on the water, it was still great to hang out on the lake all day and help others partake in my favorite hobby. We had a total of 55 skiers come out and it was a great start to the season.

The problem with ski season is that it's a great way to prolong the summer lifestyle that I hold so dear. Unfortunately, there are also weekly clashes between this false sense of summer and school. As of now, it looks as if school will win the first battle. Due to class assignments and work, I have already made the decision to miss the opening tournament. My decision was made easier by my not wanting to make the six hour drive to southwest Missouri. There's always next week.

Catch of the Week:

My catch is from Thursday's (8/28) edition of the Daily Illini. In a front page story a letter was omitted from a word in a quote. The quote from Illini Union program advisor, India Meyers, was printed, "The looked for an individual that could speak on the current political climate on account of this being an election year." The letter "y" was left off of "The." While most readers would still be able to figure out the meaning of the quote, this mistake should have been caught by the writer or copy editors, especially since it begins the quote. If it were in the middle of the quote, it would not stand out as much and could easily be overlooked by readers.

Headline Challenge

The headline (and story) I want to change is from today's edition of the Daily Illini (front page):

Invisibility now a possibility

The headline and article are both accurate, but they are misleading. The headline and article make it seem as if U of I was the first school to develop this technology.

University of California, Berkeley, however released information that they were on the way to developing the same technology almost two months ago: see link below

The DI article makes no mention of Berkeley. Perhaps the new headline should read:

U of I catches up to Berkeley

.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/08/11/2330897.htm

Living and dying in Gregory Hall

I remember the first day I first went down into the basement of Gregory Hall.  I had just transferred into the College of Communications after spending my freshman year studying waves of democracy and researching U.S. policy towards Lebanon as a political science major.  I needed out and wanted to put my writing skills to work.  Journalism sounded like the perfect answer.

I was excited for a change as I headed down to choose my classes.  The cool, quiet hallway held a certain mystique.  I was walking on tiles few students had ever traversed-- or even knew about.  It was neat to know that I now belonged to this new demographic of Illinois and had my own little hideout in the basement of GH.  

That feeling was all too fleeting.

I don't have any regrets about changing my major.  I really enjoy journalism and I'm glad I made the switch.  It's just that the once mystic aura of the basement of Gregory Hall has faded.  It's a nice place, but I'm suffering from overexposure.  

When choosing my classes for this fall,  I didn't realize that all but one class is in GH.  I suppose you'll have that with three journalism classes, but even my home gardening class, HORT 106, is in Greg.  Surely a horticulture class would be held in a garden or green house, right?  Nope, all you need to learn how to care for plants are fluorescent lights and uncomfortable chairs.

To make things worse, I'm going to be a computer lab assistant this fall.  Add 10 more hours a week in GH to the schedule.

Today is Friday.  I don't have class on Fridays.  Yet, even today I still find myself in Gregory Hall.  I just moved into my second temporary housing assignment as I eagerly await to move into 309 Green, and my new place doesn't have the Internet.

It seems as if I'm destined to spend the rest of my college days in the confines of Gregory Hall.  Maybe someday I'll get a statue.