Propaganda, Ethics, and Media—Political and Commercial Erosion of Journalism Ethics
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© 2010, Global Media Journal -- Canadian Edition Volume 3, Issue 2, pp. 1-12 ISSN: 1918-5901 (English) -- ISSN: 1918-591X (Français) Editorial: Propaganda, Ethics, and Media— Political and Commercial Erosion of Journalism Ethics Randal Marlin Carleton University, Canada That journalism in its traditional forms is in a precarious state today, few would be likely to deny. Younger people especially do not have the habit of paying regularly for their daily newspaper, and they are likely to be more absorbed by the more personal and immediate news coming from Facebook, Twitter and other social media. To this can perhaps be added a problem of declining credibility. Established media earn the respect of their readers when they assign their best reporters to investigate whether complex financial and other arrangements really do serve the public interest. But those who choose this honourable route face many obstacles. Government officials have for some decades received special coaching in how to avoid presenting information that could be damaging to the government when dealing with the media. Reporters complain today how difficult it is to get straightforward information from lower level government officials. The kind of investigative journalism I. F. Stone engaged in during the 1950s and 1960s would be more difficult today. For example he found, from interviewing an official in the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, that an underground nuclear bomb test could be detected over a thousand miles away, contrary to anti-test ban treaty government propaganda. (The episode is nicely caught in the film “I. F. Stone’s Weekly”, Dir. Jerry Bruck, 1973). One might today expect public relations coaching to anticipate such an inquiry and recommend muzzling the official ahead of time. Denise Rudnicki has described this kind of thing in “Inside the government’s message-making machine”, May 11, 2009, posted on jsource.ca. In the United States, the Government Accountability Office has documented cases where government departments have produced Video News Releases in such a way that they appear to be showing independent reporters interviewing department officials. The whole thing is scripted to favour the government department or its policies. By creating the appearance of independent journalism the government department tricks the viewer into accepting the message less critically. Meanwhile the “independent” broadcaster saves a lot of money by showing well produced content provided for free. The GAO has ruled this activity illegal, as contrary to legislation against U.S. government propaganda directed against its own citizenry. But enforcement of this legislation is itself a government matter and is commonly ignored. Randal Marlin 2 When it comes to local government, a common scenario has developers who stand to make a lot of money buying land zoned for one (unprofitable) use at low cost and then, with a favourably disposed city council, having the land re-zoned to make it much more profitable because of increased development opportunities. In this scenario public relations practitioners often advise how to package proposals and how to anticipate and defuse public objections. When this happens it is up to the media to alert the public to possible disadvantages. But if the media carry a lot of advertising by these same developers there may be a conflict of interest. Commercial influence on, in, and through the media can be more direct, and Gennadiy Chernov’s paper brings us in contact with the problem of stealth advertising, the occurrence of advertising not clearly presented as such. He does not deal directly with the ethics of such advertising, but section two of the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards states quite clearly: “No advertisement shall be presented in a format or style which conceals its commercial intent”. The underlying ethical principle supporting this prohibition would seem to be the matter of trust. Our media like to give the impression that they exist to serve readers’ interests. Disguised advertisements cloud readers’ ability to judge in proper perspective the messages they receive. We are on guard against the salesperson’s pitch. We trust the honest purveyor of news. Informants who purport to be the latter, but who in a disguised way are the former, trade unethically in the confusion of roles. When they are found out they can expect loss of trust and comparable loss of influence. Commercialization of media can be a grey area, but there are notable cases where individuals have spoken out strongly and uncompromisingly against the practice. Not everyone would agree with noted children’s book writer (Stuart Little) E. B. White’s strictures against Esquire’s publication in February 1976 of a 23-page travel article for which Xerox paid writer Harrison Salisbury $55,000 and paid for $115,000 worth of Esquire advertising. There seems to have been no obvious promotion of Xerox, but White was quite insistent that “Buying and selling space in news columns could become a serious disease of the press”, and that carried too far “it could destroy the press”. He said: “I want to read what the editor and publisher have managed to dig up on their own—and paid for out of the till” (The Boston Globe, 1976, July 5: 5). White convinced Xerox to cancel this kind of promotion, but his attitude appears to have become increasingly rare in today’s media, with the widespread acceptance of product placement, sponsorships, promotional news and the like. There is of course genuine news value in reporting the opening of a new business in the community, particularly when a lot of jobs are involved. But there are also clear cases of pseudo-events, staged with the express view of getting free publicity. In some cases the commercial element may be embedded unavoidably in a legitimate news story. Ottawa, Canada’s capital city, appears to have had such a case early in December 2010, when the newly elected mayor decided to depart from tradition and hold the new council’s inaugural celebration in a building named after a prominent developer who is a partner in a controversial development on city land (to be discussed), with catering by a well- known cross-Canada doughnut and coffee franchise; the story angles being that of saving taxpayer’s money, and the appropriateness of having the event take place away from the normal venue, city hall. On December 4, 2010, the Home section of the Ottawa Citizen carried on its front page under the heading “Too many choices” a pictorial interview with a Minto Development Inc. design consultant. Under the headline appear the words “It’s all about adding personality to the basic house”, and reference to the Citizen’s website proclaimed in bold letters “Take a tour of 3 Editorial: Propaganda, Ethics, and Media— Political and Commercial Erosion of Journalism Ethics Minto’s opulent new design centre at ottawacitizen.com”. The typography was no different from the Citizen’s regular news font, so readers might easily confuse promotional material with genuine news. Underneath was a paid display advertisement by Minto Development Inc. An old (1990s) Ottawa Citizen “Ethics and Policies” booklet, aimed at editorial staff states: “All advertising in our paper, whether it is inside the news pages or in an advertorial supplement, should be easily identifiable to any reader as an advertisement and not news” (21). We wonder how seriously this policy is taken today. Moving from grey to black, the most disturbing aspect of commercial intrusion into the media comes at the point when, to satisfy large-scale advertisers and thereby the media outlet’s own interests, the news and opinion columns become promotional rather than critically evaluative of commercial developments arguably pitting public against private interests. We will be looking at a situation of what we argue to be media bias in Ottawa, specifically with regard to print media only, but as Chernov’s paper suggests, the electronic media would also warrant watching. The conditions conducive to such bias are present wherever private enterprise stands to gain handsomely, either directly from the public purse, or indirectly from changes in regulations or zoning. Whether we deal with the Vancouver Olympics, or repeal of the banking controls under the Glass-Steagall Act in the United States, it is to be expected that private corporations standing to benefit would work hard to present a convincing case to the public through the media. When a great deal is at stake, we can expect attempts to fund the campaigns of sympathetic political candidates, or to fund pseudo “grass roots” organizations to create the appearance of a public groundswell in favour of those private interests, while not revealing that those same interests fund and guide the organizations. A new Australian film by Larrikan Films, with the title of “[Astro] Turf Wars” traces brilliantly and courageously the influence of energy magnates over the Tea Party and other groups who act, wittingly or otherwise, as front groups for their interests. The Ottawa case involves a 37-acre tract of city-owned land called Lansdowne Park, close to downtown on a beautiful site, overlooking one of the UNESCO designated world class heritage sites, the Rideau Canal, on both south and east boundaries. Part of a neighbourhood called the Glebe, it has a stadium that used to host a national league football team, the Ottawa Rough Riders. The big problem, and a contributing reason why attempts to resurrect professional football of that scale have failed (twice), has been the absence of a roadway environment suitable for rapidly conveying upwards of 20,000 people to and from the site. Unlike most successful stadiums, it lacks any form of rapid transit, whether train, car or bus, and there is no available corridor to establish one.