Details to Avoid

Reporters must learn to recognize the types of information that are not considered newsworthy and that news organizations rarely use. News organizations rarely mention routine procedures, such as the fact that a city council met in a city hall and began its meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance. Reporters delete the obvious and the irrelevant: the fact that police officers rushed to the scene of a traffic accident, or that an ambulance carried the injured to a hospital.

News organizations often must decide whether to use information about a crisis or threat. The so-called Unabomber, whose decades-long series of terror bombings baffled law enforcement authorities, sent a lengthy manifesto to The New York Times and The Washington Post. He promised that his killings would stop if the papers published his writings. The newspapers’ executives decided to publish, knowing that the bomber might make good on his threat to continue bombing. Not all journalists agreed with that decision, but the publication of the manifesto led to the arrest of Theodore J. Kaczynski. One of his relatives, who noted similarities between the Unabomber manifesto and other anarchist writings by Kaczynski, alerted law enforcement agencies.

Offensive Details: Generally, editors omit material that is obscene or in poor taste, usually on the grounds their newspapers or broadcasts reach children as well as adults. What would be the point, for example, of using gruesome photographs or video, particularly when the material lacked significance? Normally, news organizations avoid specifics about sexual assaults and omit most bloody details about accidents.

Different news organizations adopt different policies about what kinds of information they will use. Journalists must understand their employers’ policies.

Sensationalism

Most news organizations avoid sensationalism, but not sensational stories. Historically, the, word “sensationalism” has described an emphasis on or exaggeration of stories dealing with crime, sex and oddities. However, some events are inherently sensational-presidential assassinations, wars and other disasters. News stories do not make such events sensational, but the news media report on them because of their importance.

Journalists evaluating a potentially scandalous or sensational story must weigh several conflicting considerations and may ask themselves:

• Is the story newsworthy?
• Does the public need and have a right to this information?
• How seriously will this story harm the people it mentions?
• How will readers react to the information?

Some journalists might balance these interests by avoiding anything tasteless or sensational, but that approach can make reporting the news more difficult. A federal judge’s ruling that the lyrics of a 2 Live Crew song were obscene contributed to a national furor about censor-ship and sexually graphic music. Ironically, it was impossible for most readers to decide for themselves whether the lyrics were offensive and obscene because newspapers refused to print the lyrics. The lyrics called women “bitches” and mentioned forcing anal sex on a woman, forcing a woman to lick feces and “busting” the walls of a vagina. Another controversy involved the work of photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. News organizations reported that some people objected to exhibits of Mapplethorpe’s photo- graphs because some were “homoerotic.” Editors were hesitant to report that one photograph showed a man urinating into another man’s mouth, that another photograph showed a finger inserted in a penis, and that three other photographs showed men with various objects inserted in their rectums. Now news organizations find them-selves reporting stories about obscene words and images used on the Internet. Again, editors must decide what language to use to accurately report messages coming through cyberspace without offending readers and viewers.

There are no rights or wrong answers to these problems; each is a matter of individual judgment. The examples, however, reflect journalists’ dilemma. Journalists are reluctant to report graphic details likely to offend the public. Yet readers denied those details may consider them important.

Rumors: News organizations are reluctant to report rumors, especially harmful ones. Yet the failure to re-port some rumors may confuse, frighten or alienate the public. As a rumor spreads through a community, more people are likely to become interested in it and believe it. People who hear a rumor but see no coverage of it also are likely to believe that journalists are deliberately sup-pressing the story.

Some rumors involve important issues, such as racial conflicts, and may cause widespread anxiety. Normally, responsible editors investigate the rumors and, if they find no evidence the rumors are true, conclude there is no story. Editors will consider a rumor’s effects upon the community, and especially upon innocent people. They may decide a story exposing a rumor as untrue will be more helpful to the people involved-such as by clearing a person’s reputation-than if the news organization remained silent. In the wake of Hurricane Andrew in Florida, The Orlando (Fla.) Sentinel exposed many rumors. “Thirty-six days after Hurricane Andrew roared through South Dade [County],” a reporter wrote, “the rumor mill is working as hard as disaster relief crews, passing wild tales across the state about the conspiracy to hide a mounting death toll” Among the rumors: Bodies were loaded into refrigerated trucks in the dark of night, U.S. Navy submarines fired corpses into the ocean through torpedo tubes, the dead were stockpiled at Homestead Air Force Base, and countless bodies were burned along with hurricane debris. The story explained away each rumor with facts.

Rape: Most news organizations refuse to identify the victims of rape, even when they have a legal right to do so. Some journalists believe that publishing the names of victims may discourage women from reporting the crime. Reporters should learn their organization’s policy regarding the use of rape victims’ names. To help the media deal with issues concerning victims and survivors of rape and other violent crimes, the National Center for the Victims of Crime in Arlington, Va., established several voluntary guidelines. Among other things, the guidelines advise reporters to:

• Give the public factual, objective information concerning the type of crime, where it occurred, the name or description of the alleged offender if appropriate, and facts that may prevent other crimes.
• Give equal coverage to the victim’s and the criminal’s perspectives when possible.
• Quote the victims, families and friends fairly and in context.
• Avoid photographing or filming lurid crime details, such as bodies or instruments of torture.
• Notify and ask permission from victims and their families before using pictures or photographs for documentaries or other news features.
• Refrain from publishing unverified or ambiguous facts about the victims, their demeanor, background or relationship to the offender.
• Officials of the National Center for Victims of Crime say news reporters will get better stories about crime if they show sensitivity toward the victims.