Eric Hammell

4/20/99

Media Law and Ethics

Ethics Application Paper (Maass)

One major ethical dilemma presented in Peter Maass’ Love the Neighbor: A Story of War is deciding whether it’s ethical for a reporter to make trouble for other people in the pursuit of a story. In gathering the news, a reporter utilizes interviewees and the help of colleagues who may be in danger or put in a bad situation by doing so. In some cases, talking with a journalist can make a bad situation worse. Here I will rationalize whether the reporter should allow this to happen.

This dilemma presents itself in chapter 2 when Maass visits the prison called Trnopolje. Talking with prisoners, Maass may have endangered them. "He was staring, like a deer caught in a car’s headlights, at the spot just above my head. I looked around. A guard stood behind me." (Maass 42) Maass endangers another prisoner by following him into an area of the prison he was not supposed to be in. "I feared not only the trouble that I might be getting into, but the trouble that he might be getting into." (Maass 42) Later Maass gives a prisoner a ham sandwich. (Maass 43) It is reasonable to say the prisoner would surely have been beaten if a guard discovered the sandwich. Later, at another camp called Omarska, Maass realized talking to journalists is employed as another form of torture for the prisoners. "It was another act of humiliation for the prisoners and, this time, for the journalists too." (Maass 47) "The visit of journalists was just another form of torture." (Maass 47)

Another situation where the ethical dilemma presented itself when Maass was talking with a family in their backyard. A military vehicle was driving by and Maass knew what would happen if they spotted them talking. "Once they learn you are a journalist, the family is doomed. They will be shot on the spot or, if they are lucky, they will be taken away, and perhaps only the men will be shot." (Maass 94) "…. It will remind you that you were another do-gooding American who made foolish mistakes that other people paid for. This was one of the curses of working in Bosnia. You had the monstrous power to lead people to their deaths." (Maass 95)

We can use the ethical framework of Utilitarianism to evaluate this moral dilemma. Utilitarianism states that, "whenever we have a choice between alternative actions or social policies, we must choose the one that has the best overall consequences for everyone concerned." (Rachels 97) It is important to note that Utilitarianism is concerned only with consequences, nothing else matters. Utilitarianism is concerned with the amount of happiness that will be brought about by a decision. (Rachels 98) Also, "no one’s happiness is to be counted as more important than anyone else’s. Each person’s welfare is equally important." (Rachels 107) Utilitarianism posits that we should seek the greatest good for the greatest number over the long term and is not concerned with external goods.

The two most feasible choices we have in this dilemma are: 1) Allow people to take risks and be placed in difficult situations to further the work of journalists, or, 2) Do not allow people to take risks and be placed in difficult situations, find another source.

Utilitarianism’s first order of business would be to determine what is the greatest good for the greatest number over the long term. Our loyalties as a reporter in this dilemma would be: duty to your newspaper, the American public, the victims of war, the overall readership (including Bosnians), and yourself as a practitioner. These are the parties involved we must consider with equal measure.

If we allow people to be placed in unfavorable situations we might gain information and insight that thousands of news readers can benefit from. One could argue that knowledge makes people happy in that people like to be informed. In the long run, people would be very unhappy to discover their press did not inform them about certain aspects of a situation. A consequence of having that information published might be that readers would attempt to help the interviewee and others like him or her. The journalist and his paper would obviously benefit from having more information for their work. The only person who might be hurt would be the person willfully placing him or herself in danger. It’s difficult to say with any accuracy whether or not the person will actually be lead to unhappiness by their contribution. The person may actually be unhappy as a result of not being allowed to contribute.

On the other hand, the greatest good for the greatest number over the long term might best be served by not endangering others. Its just as difficult to evaluate whether people will be happy by being informed as it is to evaluate whether the contributor will be subjected to unhappiness by contributing to the news. Who’s to say reading about concentration camps doesn’t make people unhappy? In this case, the readers are unhappy and the contributor is unhappy. The only people gaining happiness are the reporter and his newspaper colleagues.

Looking at the dilemma through the framework of Utilitarianism, the most ethical stance would be for reporters to allow people to place themselves in unfavorable positions in order to gain information for news stories. The sheer number of reasons (listed above) for allowing this are greater then for not allowing it.

The probability for the greatest happiness seems to be served by allowing interviewees to be in harms way. It is certainly probable that the reporter and his or her newspaper will be happy as a result of the information. This serves the journalistic value of freedom; the journalist has the freedom to publish. It also seems more probable that people will be happy to be informed (rather than ignorant) than that they will be unhappy to learn the truth. This is substantiated by the fact of the large amount of news readership, even though a lot of news stories aren’t exactly uplifting. Therefore, its probable to say the numbers who are happy through being informed outweigh those who would rather be ignorant than read a sad story. In turn, those numbers of happy readers obviously outweigh the 1 person put at risk. Also, Utilitarianism might not even consider the unhappiness of those that read the story and are unhappy by their knowledge of it, for that unhappiness is most likely short term. In informing the public, the journalist is serving the value of truthfulness by getting another perspective and stewardship by having the courage and insight to do so.

The contributor, as stated earlier, may actually be unhappy for not being allowed to contribute. Perhaps he or she wants to take a stand against his or her aggressor. This would support the journalistic value of justice. Also, can not legitimately say that being punished for contributing will cause greater unhappiness. At first this may seem cold, but we must put ourselves in that persons position. After all, their well being is just as important as ours is. I would posit that the contributor is willing to take the risk because he or she feels nothing could happen that would be worse than what is already happening. Some contributors may actually be on their deathbed. It is therefore humane to allow them not to die silently in vain. They are empowered, therefore, by having a voice of resistance in the news.