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Can reporters act like citizens in the US?

by biverson | June 29, 2007 at 05:56 am

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A recent story about where 143 journalists' political contributions went, got at least three of them fired or dropped from client papers. In a media world where transparency is a by-product of the whole blogs, search, connected, networked communication process, does this make sense? Doesn't any viewer/user who wants to have access to all kinds of information about an author or reporter? So, shouldn't you be able to read and get a story whether or not the writer was involved in the political process. I guess it comes down to whether you believe that anyone can be "objective" or that any of the media outlets are actually producing news that is free of a point of view. Do you?

SPJ National Ethics Committee Chairman Andrews Schotz said: "Contributing to a political cause clearly damages the credibility of anyone who professes to be a detached reporter of events. It's less of an ethical violation for opinion writers, who can and should tell readers their allegiances."

And SPJ President Christine Tatum, an assistant features editor and multimedia editor at The Denver Post, added: "Journalists who insist on supporting political causes should publicize their contributions and not work on relevant news stories."

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Jordan Yerman

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 07:09 on June 29th, 2007

biverson, I honestly don't believe that true objectivity exists: by choosing what we cover, we make editorial decisions via omission. Though not a trained journo, I favor disclosure above pretending to be some kind of newsbot.