To Publish or Not

¶ … Publish or Not to Publish? One of the recurring ethical dilemmas in journalism is whether or not to publish photographs that may be considered offensive to some portion of the public, may promote the goal of a person who committed an offense, or that are extremely violent or graphic. This dilemma has recently recurred in debate surrounding the printing or distribution of photographs or videotapes that show the death of Joshua Bernard and the beheading of James Foley by the terrorist organization, Isis.

Many people feel that distributing these photos is disrespectful, not only to the victims, but also to their family members. They believe that the victims deserve to be remembered in life and not reduced to a victim status. Other people worry that distributing images of something like a soldier's death or a beheadings will actually promote hostile goals, by encouraging fear in the population. While those concerns are valid, they are insufficient to merit a conclusion that the images should not be shown.

Moreover, they ignore the role of the press in a free society. The job of the press is to report the news and to provide as much information as possible to the public. One of the most emotional arguments is that it is disrespectful to victims and their families to show images of them being killed or after having been brutalized. This argument is appealing because almost everyone can empathize with the victims or their families.

However, reporting the news is not and should not be dependent upon the emotional impact of that news on a few individuals. Images of Joshua Bernard's death are a critical part of the news cycle. It is far too easy for people in the United States to ignore the reality of war and the fact that real people are dying in Afghanistan. Instead, when people in the U.S.

do see images of dead soldiers, they are tidy images of bodies in caskets, or photos of the young men and women while they were alive. Ironically, the footage of his death brings the reality of the war to life in a way that nothing else could. As a result, it would be irresponsible of a news organization to fail to report that information.

James Foley's beheading may not provide the same amount of information to the public as Bernard's death footage does, since reports of his beheading could convey the fact of his death, but that does not mean that they should not be distributed. The fact that Isis filmed Foley's murder is a critical part of the story. Moreover, there may be information available in the film that is not available in a simple description of the film.

At the very least, the film conveys some of the emotion, or lack thereof, by the executioners, providing insight into the attitudes of some members of Isis. The concern that distribution of these images will somehow give power to enemies of the United States is understandable, but misplaced. The reality is that the majority of Americans are not in danger of being killed by Isis or in combat. The threat is sufficiently removed from the public to ensure that displaying those images will not promote any type of hysteria.

Moreover, while they may result in fear, that fear may be a rational response to the depicted events. The reality is that modern entertainment-news has made many people uncertain about the real role of journalists in society. The press has a single job: report the.