How Far Is Too Far?

Kelsey Hoak
kh605810@ohio.edu

America is one of the greatest countries for a journalist to live in. We are given so much freedom under the First Amendment that we can pretty much report on whatever we want. However, there is a problem that some journalists find themselves facing: national security. When is reporting on a secret government issue a problem and when is it something that should be reported for public trust?

WikiLeaks... Helpful or Hurtful?

Julian Assange and the whole group at WikiLeaks has been extremely scrutinized over the last few years for publishing different classified government information. A few years ago when they disclosed the Afghanistan war logs there was controversy because the group allowed only three newspapers access to the information. According to Steve Meyer, WikiLeaks acts as an information broker, which can be a scary deal for the government.

The problem for journalists lies in the fact that they have to decide if information is accurate and if WikiLeaks can be considered a credible source to use in a story that might threaten national security. These stories that WikiLeaks is getting involved with aren't cute stories about how many puppies were born in the brand new kennel in town. If you accidentally report that six were born but there were actually seven, you can go back and fix your mistake tomorrow.

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But if you trust WikiLeaks on information that hurts our national security and that information is incorrect you could have just put our entire country into a state of panic or worse.

In my opinion, WikiLeaks can be a dangerous group to get involved with. Do you want that breaking story for your front page? Yes, of course you do. This is competitive journalism, right? But at what risk are you willing to sacrifice a downward spiral for your paper?

Here enters Journalism Ethics 101. As a journalist we are supposed to keep the public's trust. If you were the editor for The New York Times three years ago when WikiLeaks presented them with the Afghan war logs a month before they released the information would you take it or would you give it back? If you want to keep the trust and be accountable to the public then you should take the documents, review them and decide if they should be published.

Who Do Journalists Work For?

The WikiLeaks debate will help a journalist answer the question about who they report to. Do they report to the public or to the government? This can be a little tricky because as an American you want to keep your country safe, and depending on your political views and who is in office at the time you might be more favorable to let a thing or two slide. But if you did that then you wouldn't be a very ethical journalist, now would you?

The next topic that relates to who they work for is what kind of work do they actually do. A journalists work can't really be defined. Nowadays pretty much anyone can be some sort of a journalist. Does that make them a good or credible journalist? Not necessarily, but under the First Amendment they can write about whatever they want.

Is WikiLeaks Allowed To Report These Things?

Whether or not this big mainly untraceable group is allowed to continue to report these things is questionable after the NSA scandal that occurred over the summer. But the government will have a pretty hard time trying to shut everything down. The fathers of this country wanted the press to be a checks and balances system and WikiLeaks is just trying to take that as far as it will go. There are some people in this country who support the so called "leakers".

As to whether or not journalists for places like The New York Times and The Guardian will continue to use the information from WikiLeaks, we will just have to wait and see.