Freedom of the Press

Journalists should have the freedom to tell the truth. This sounds like such an obvious answer, but in all honesty most journalists have to be very careful about the truths they describe in their articles. You have to take into account all of your potential viewers, as well as how they will each individually interpret your work. All journalists should have limitations. There are some things that should be omitted when presenting a story. Reporters without Borders

With the power to write openly, comes a lot of responsibility. People have a right to know the whole story, yet you as a journalist have the duty to tell the truth without violating human rights. You have an obligation to your moral principles (that’s assuming you have any). For example; there is a car crash in your town, a mother and her two kids are present, and the two children die. Do you write the article and present the pictures from the scene? I wouldn’t, and you shouldn’t, everyone should be able to have the time to mourn. I can guarantee this exact scenario has been played out, probably more than once.

I think there is more freedom on a wider scale, because when you are writing for a nation you have less accountability to your readers. It becomes more limited as you limit readers. If Dan Feser wasn’t careful about what he wrote, no one would continue to read it and there would be an uprising (not counting spelling errors). When you look at our coverage in Provincial Volleyball certain issues arose that we needed to address, we agreed it wasn’t necessary to our stories, but also that it would be unethical to bring up past events just to entertain.

KL