Remaining Ethical in the 24/7 News Cycle

Courtesy of Social Media Week

Devon Stephen
ds708914@ohio.edu

We Want News and We Want it NOW

Constantly switching between Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, we aren’t used to waiting for the next thing. When we want to see a post, check a status or send out a tweet, our fingertips grant our wishes in seconds. It sounds great, but the rapid pace of our new lifestyle has generated a ceaseless demand for instantaneous news. According to a 2013 article by Poynter, journalists have been forced to succumb to the public’s high expectations for the media. In the article, John Strang, an editor with WFLA-TV in Tampa called it “feeding the beast.”

Commonly, news organizations keep up with the demand for news is by breaking a crime story that’s sure to generate attention on the site or social media account. Unfortunately, typos and factual errors can happen more frequently because in many news organizations journalists have the freedom to post online without an editor’s approval. According to Graham Rayman, a Village Voice investigator who spent 11 years covering crime and other beats for Newsday, those errors “kill your credibility.” The 24/7 news cycle also puts journalists at risk for making misguided ethical decisions. When faced with micro-deadlines and the pressure of live-tweeting updates to a news hungry audience, journalists can opt to get a story out before considering all the possible ethical dilemmas and ramifications a story may entail.

New Challenges in a Right-Now World

Journalists feel pressure to be the first to report an incident, event or situation because their competition is everywhere. Now, every person on the street with a smart phone has the power to break a story. That is especially true when it comes to crime reporting. For example, victims of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas in Parkland were live-tweeting the shooting, asking for help and sharing the news. Another example is the arrest of Eric Garner, the black man who was arrested and suffocated on a public sidewalk by New York City police, which was recorded and shared on Twitter by a concerned citizen. Citizen journalism threatens ethical decision-making on the part of news outlets and reporters with deadlines.

Regardless of the deadline, journalists have to consider the context of the crime. We also need to be careful about how we report crimes—especially crimes that are becoming more common. In a rush to report, it’s easy for journalists to sensationalize the crime by focusing on the perpetrator rather than the victims or the overarching issue. Mass shootings are an example of an increasingly frequent crime that is reported quickly and, according to an article from the Columbia Journalism Review, improperly.

Over-sensationalizing Mass Shootings

When a mass shooting happens, reporters have a responsibility to inform the public. That means gathering all the details of the shooting, including information on the alleged shooter. However, journalists also have a responsibility to maintain ethical codes and values to minimize harm when reporting. Adam Lankford, an associate professor of criminology and criminal justice at the University of Alabama, argues that coverage focusing primarily on the perpetrators only “facilitates and fuels subcultures with people who are disturbed and troubled.” In other words, it exacerbates the problem. He believes that media reports on shootings can normalize the behavior and cultivate a sort of “fan base” for disturbed people capable of committing heinous crimes.

"No Notoriety"

Andrew Pollack, whose daughter Meadow
was killed in the Parkland shooting, tweets encouraging
others to refuse to give notoriety to the shooter

The No Notoriety organization was launched by Tom and Caren Teves, who lost their son Alex in the Aurora, Colo., movie theater shooting. According to an LA Times article with the headline “Column: Mass shooters seek notoriety, and we, the media, provide it. Is there another way?”, the goal of the organization is to persuade the media to deny mass shooters the notoriety they seek. Some of the ways No Notoriety believes the media can prevent shooters from feeling famous include not publishing the shooter’s name or photos that may make them seem impressive. The article explains that the requests from No Notoriety are based on studies that analyze mass shooter motives. In 2015, researchers found proof that mass shootings actually incite future shootings. The study showed that a subsequent mass shooting is more likely to occur within 13 days of the prior shooting, and that one school shooting incites .22 new incidents on average. The study also found that media coverage plays a role.

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A campaign and organization launched to ask journalists to change the way they report shootings should be a wake-up call for news outlets and reporters who value ethical journalism. Research shows that reporting on shootings without humanizing shooters is how we can avoid turning them into antiheroes, which fuels the fire. Though some journalists may argue that the way we currently report on shootings (ranking shootings in order of magnitude) gives readers a sense of historical significance and scale, research shows that shooters see those rankings as scoreboards.

Final Thoughts

Although the 24-hour news cycle can be intimidating for journalists, we have to remain calm and steady enough to make ethical decisions. If forced to choose, it’s best to sacrifice being the first to break a story in exchange for being the reporter whose story is the most accurate and ethical. When it comes to crimes like mass shootings, I believe there is a way to report on the crime without sensationalizing the tragedy or inspiring other shooters. If we can do even a little bit to avoid harming the public further after a traumatic loss of life, we must hold ourselves responsible for doing so.

As journalists, we have to report on the news. We have to talk about the shootings, and we have to tell the public who is responsible for so many lives lost. But we don’t have to cause any additional harm. We owe it to the public to listen to organizations like No Notoriety and respect the information that researchers have found about sensationalizing shooters. Ethically, journalists must decide what’s more important: being the first to break a story and getting the most hits on an online article, or our ethical obligation to minimize harm. Spoiler alert: it’s always more important to remain ethical. Especially in this era of 24/7 news.