In 1981, Janet Cooke won a Pulitzer Prize for a Washington Post story on Jimmy, who was portrayed as an 8-year-old heroin addict. When inconsistencies later arose, Cooke admitted Jimmy didn’t exist and returned her Pulitzer. Over two decades later, two rising stars in the journalism world were fired — Jayson Blair by The New York Times in 2003 and Jack Kelley by USA Today in 2004 — both for fabricating information for many stories.
This is what usually comes to mind when “unethical journalism” comes up — overt deception with made-up storylines, fabricated sources, etc. Although that sometimes does happen, it’s exceptional, and by far not the most common breach of journalistic ethics.
At a time when Gallup reports American trust in mass media plummeting to record lows, it’s important to expand our public conversation to account for other lesser-known ways that trust has been broken in the past by newspapers and other media outlets — to ensure these crucial institutions can do better in the future and rise to the important trust placed upon them.
In 2022, Jonathan Haidt told me in an interview for the Deseret News that “the spectacular failure of the late 2010s” was that leaders of universities and newspapers (“our knowledge-centered institutions,” as he put it) “have failed to stand up for the mission of their institutions.”
“I don’t expect everyone to care about the whole truth,” he added, “but professors should, and any academic institution should” — and, he implied, journalists should too.
Yet in a surprising number of less dramatic ways that escape public attention, a profession tasked with informing the public with the full truth about matters has struggled to do so. With the gold-standard ethical norms at the Society of Professional Journalists as the starting point, I summarize below a number of ways that journalistic ethics are being subtly skirted and sometimes openly flouted today.
1. Not openly acknowledging strong bias driving the reporting
The ethical violation receiving perhaps the most attention is when readers notice a barely concealed agenda driving the news reporting — from past anti-Biden or pro-Biden sentiments informing a selective stream of favorable or unfavorable stories, to the equally careful curation of anti-Trump and pro-Trump reports and commentaries on different platforms.
Any publishing outlet, of course, comes from a particular perspective. My employer, the Deseret News, clearly values faith, religion and family — something the publication has been open and transparent about since its inception 175 years ago this June.
It’s when strong bias is not openly admitted and instead stays hidden that problems arise, whether that’s covering up a general hostility to a particular ideology, faith or public figure being reported on. This hidden bias can show up in stories being highlighted (and not highlighted), the timing of stories featured (and buried), the sources interviewed (and not interviewed), the context included (and ignored) and the particular framing that shapes the entirety of its details.
“Journalists should examine the ways their values and experiences may shape their reporting,” the SPJ Code of Ethics states. If something is legitimately “advocacy and commentary,” the ethics code stipulates that it be labeled as such. The Global Charter of Ethics for Journalists likewise states that journalists need to “make sure to clearly distinguish factual information from commentary and criticism.”
2. Generalizing from unrepresentative sources
Joel Campbell, an associate teaching professor focused on journalism principles in the Brigham Young University School of Communications, shares a growing concern about a trend of leaving out potential voices that would otherwise help represent the full picture of a story.
This is especially important with highly sensitive stories about a contested issue. “Wasn’t there a couple of people that you spoke with who could have offered a more positive take,” he said by way of example in a recent story. “Would it have hurt to find a couple?”
In such an instance, oversampling negative voices, without providing a balance of positive voices, inevitably creates a skewed and jaded picture. “The balance is troubling” in many stories, Campbell observes. “What about the stakeholders whose voices are not represented in the story?” he says, referencing two of the accuracy questions that David Yarnold, former editor of the San Jose Mercury News, once posed, “Will some people like this story more than they should? Is something missing?”
Especially when reporting on subjects facing criticism or “allegations of wrongdoing,” the SPJ Code of Ethics states how important it is for journalists to “diligently seek subjects” and “allow them to respond.”
3. Selectively ignoring meaningful context
Along with selectively sidelining voices critical to the full picture of a story, the selective omission of key parts of the larger context is another way a Rita-Skeeter-style slant can infect a story (the sharp-tongued journalist who never failed to find a way to deform Harry Potter in her publications).
In a section entitled “Seek Truth and Report It,” the SPJ Code of Ethics states that “ethical journalism should be accurate and fair” — further stipulating how important it is to “provide context” and encouraging reporters to “take special care not to misrepresent or oversimplify in promoting, previewing or summarizing a story.”
“Never deliberately distort facts or context, including visual information,” the code of ethics continues — highlighting how even strategic discoloring and unflattering angles can also constitute distorted reporting.
“No story is fair if it omits facts of major importance or significance. Fairness includes completeness,” states The Washington Post Policies and Standards. “No story is fair if it includes essentially irrelevant information at the expense of significant facts.”
4. Presenting analysts with hidden bias as trustworthy
A 2008 New York Times investigation found that cable news shows were bringing on retired military officers as analysts with ties to military contractors with a vested stake “in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.” This was also part of an organized effort involving the Pentagon to generate favorable coverage of the Bush administration’s performance in the Iraq War.
News reporting over recent decades has also sometimes relied on spokespersons favorable to a certain industry or commercial interest — including researchers on the payroll of food companies, pharmaceutical companies and even the pornography industry — all of which has contributed to industry-friendly reporting.
Other reporting over-samples commentators with a slant decidedly in favor or opposed to one political party. Of course, for a publication committed to the public value of faith, the Deseret News does feature religious voices frequently — an emphasis the paper is open and transparent about.
The trouble comes, once again, when experts featured on any platform are portrayed as fair and objective, when, in fact, they consistently bring hostility and cynicism to their observations about faith. “It’s easy to beat up on people” PBS NewsHour co-founder Jim Lehrer would often say. “You can’t really be objective, but you can be fair.”
“Transparency is the new objectivity,” wrote Gabriel Kahn in 2017, a professor at the USC Annenberg School of Journalism. That openness is key. While seeking to “avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived,” The SPJ Code of Ethics encourages journalists to “disclose unavoidable conflicts.”
5. Overreliance on anonymous, unnamed sources
In 2008, The New York Times published a story implying that an inappropriate relationship had occurred between then-GOP presidential candidate Sen. John McCain of Arizona and a lobbyist. The story relied on quotes from anonymous McCain aides, while being unclear the exact nature of the alleged relationship.
The Times ombudsman Clark Hoyt wrote at the time, “If you cannot provide readers with some independent evidence, I think it is wrong to report the suppositions or concerns of anonymous aides.”
When sources are used, it’s generally important to “identify sources clearly,” according to the SPJ Code of Ethics, which adds, “The public is entitled to as much information as possible to judge the reliability and motivations of sources.”
Although anonymity remains a crucial protection to those legitimately threatened with harm, that cloak can also be used to allow sources to vent and make extreme accusations. Campbell describes a growing concern among D.C. area journalists to “reconsider how often they use anonymous sources, because people have political axes to grind.”
When it still seems necessary to publish an anonymous source, the SPJ ethical code goes on to encourage journalists to “consider sources’ motives” before promising such anonymity. Yet even so, one of Lehrer’s ground rules for storytelling was, “Do not use anonymous sources or blind quotes except on rare and monumental occasions. No one should be able to attack another anonymously.”
6. A narrative in search of facts
Lehrer once cautioned about a “new arrogance” arising among some of his peers, describing “the fact that some in my line of work have developed an approach in words, sneers and body language that says loud and clear: Only the journalists of America are pure enough to judge others. And judge we must.”
Campbell similarly shares his concern at how often he sees modern journalists “go in with a certain thesis” and “set out with a preconceived notion, and want to prove it.” Instead of trying to evaluate all the data like a social scientist and “hear all the facts before reaching a conclusion,” as Campbell was taught as a young journalist, these days many go “looking for supporting sources to confirm the bias and thesis they have.”
Sometimes the commitment to a particular narrative is so strong, that few if any hard facts are needed. Lehrer himself believed that what he called “no-source reporting” was harming the public’s trust in reporters.
Since coming on full time to the Deseret News, I’m struck at how often I’ve heard from editors a dogged insistence on backing up truth claims — “Can we verify that? How do we know that’s true? If there’s not a source for that, we can’t say it.”
Nonetheless, this other kind of impassioned “story-first journalism” or “narrative journalism” is often celebrated these days. As Campbell says, “it wins awards” — pointing to how easy it can be to “set up a story, with a real-person example, and try to paint your picture and expand attention to the issue.”
But you “have to be careful about narrative driving too simplistic a picture,” he adds. “There isn’t enough humility for the facts,” Campbell says, highlighting an “unwillingness to know that maybe you’re wrong about a story once you get into the facts and the reporting.”
“A lot of times journalists are short circuiting that process of finding the truth.”
7. Inattention to harm prompted by reporting
“Show compassion for those who may be affected by news coverage,” states the SPJ Code of Ethics in a section called “Minimize Harm.” While acknowledging that “public figures and others who seek power, influence or attention” ought to be more open to scrutiny, this code encourages journalists to “consider the long-term implications of the extended reach and permanence of publication.”
“Avoid pandering to lurid curiosity, even if others do,” adds the SPJ Code of Ethics. “Balance the public’s need for information against potential harm or discomfort. Pursuit of the news is not a license for arrogance or undue intrusiveness.”
The Global Charter of Ethics for Journalists likewise states that “journalists shall ensure that the dissemination of information or opinion does not contribute to hatred or prejudice and shall do their utmost to avoid facilitating the spread of discrimination on grounds such as geographical, social or ethnic origin, race, gender, sexual orientation, language, religion, disability, political and other opinions.”
“Journalists worthy of the name shall deem it their duty to observe faithfully the principles stated above,” they underscore.
Towards a journalism of civility, compassion and respect
“Journalism, as practiced by some, has become akin to professional wrestling — something to watch rather than to believe,” Lehrer told an audience of international journalists in 1998, lamenting the “savagery that’s become part and parcel of the so-called new journalism.”
“Ethical journalism treats sources, subjects, colleagues and members of the public as human beings deserving of respect,” the SPJ Code of Ethics states. This is especially crucial on stories that raise serious allegations and concerns.
Rather than merely telling people what to think, journalism at its best arises from a desire to give the public a “chance to see the whole thing and make your own judgments,” as Lehrer told viewers on the first day he covered the Watergate scandal.
“What if the roles were reversed?” asks the Poynter Institute in a query that resembles a journalistic golden rule. “How would I feel if I were in the shoes of one of the stakeholders?” Two of Lehrer’s own personal rules were likewise “Cover, write and present every story with the care I would want if the story were about me” and “Assume the viewer is as smart and as caring and as good a person as I am. Assume the same about all people on whom I report.”
“Support the open and civil exchange of views” The SPJ Code of Ethics concludes in its final section, suggesting journalists “encourage a civil dialogue with the public about journalistic practices, coverage and news content.”