Ethical Guidelines: Are There Too Many Gray Areas?

Autum Meyers 

autummeyers33@gmail.com

Source: https://www.eurasiareview.com/28052019-media-ethics-in-professional-journalism-ethics-and-moral-judgment-essay/

It amazes me that during a time when most people are distrusting and skeptical of the media, our media professionals continue to abide by ethical codes rather than a list of strict rules. You would think that by now there would a set of rules that all media professionals would have to follow--rules with clear lines and expectations--but instead, we continue to follow loose guidelines that don't explicitly tell us if what we're doing is completely right or wrong. 

Because of this, there is a lot of moral ambiguity and debate about whether something should or shouldn't be done, and at the end of the day, it's still not easy to tell. The question is though, is our current way of doing things the best way to continue the future of journalism, or are there too many gray areas that need combating with stricter rules? 

The current argument for having ethical guidelines rather than clearly defined rules is that it allows people to have freedom of speech. Those in charge of making the guidelines feel that enforcing the code of ethics would jeopardize freedom of speech, and that it's better to hold each other accountable and discredit poor journalism with more speech rather than force people to follow rules that may inhibit their message.

https://www.spj.org/ethicsfaq.asp

This is a solid argument that I can get behind. I agree that maintaining freedom of speech is an important part of all media and that enforcing rules could definitely jeopardize what free speech is all about. What I'm still not sure about, though, is whether the codes we are holding each other accountable to are clear enough for people to make good, ethical decisions. 

Comparing many of the ethical codes that are out there in the world such as SPJ, RTDNA, NPPA ASME, and many others, they all have very similar principles. They all advocate for truthfulness, transparency, accountability, acting independently, and, at the end of the day, doing what's ultimately best for the public. 

https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp 

https://www.rtdna.org/content/rtdna_code_of_ethics

https://nppa.org/code-ethics

https://www.asme.media/editorial-guidelines

The fact that all of these codes of ethics support and concur with one another means that the standards for ethical media practices are universal. Everyone agrees that things like truthfulness and transparency are the things that we need to strive for--and this agreement is good. We're not disagreeing on what our expectations are, and that cuts down the ambiguity quite a bit. 

However, there is still ambiguity within the ethical guidelines we have already agreed upon. For example, the guidelines stress that we need to be transparent and provide access to our source material, but what if that source material jeopardizes somebody's life or their reputation? Avoiding harm is also an ethical guideline. What are you supposed to do then? 

There are a lot of gray areas and moral dilemmas that happen because our media professionals abide by guidelines rather than rules. I personally feel that there is too much gray in media decision-making and that something needs to be done. At the same time, though, I believe that we cannot leave our freedom of speech vulnerable to the government. 

I don't have the answers or solutions to this issue, but I definitely feel that it's something that needs to be discussed amongst ourselves so that we can strengthen our media going forward.