Guest posted by Chris Nelson (KU student) for my class "Ethics & Media":
The idea of this "steroid era" really started back in 1998 when Mark McGwireand Sammy Sosa were chasing Roger Maris' home run record of 61 in a single season, a record that was established in 1961. Everyone suspected that the sluggers, especially McGwire, were on something, but no one cared. The two men eventually chased down the record and continued to demolish it when McGwire hit number 70 on the last day of the season (Sosa ended with 66). Then along came Barry Bonds and his revamped body. In the early to mid '90s, Bonds was a lean base stealer who could also hit for power. After the 1998 season, it seemed that Bonds was jealous of the homer hype. This is when most suspect he started using. Bonds would end up breaking McGwire's record in 2001 with a total of 73 home runs. I know that records are made to be broken, but...
Recently, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates discussed and then announcedthat the U.S. government was going to reverse an 18-year policy on banning photographs of the flag-draped coffins of U.S. service people who have died overseas arriving at Dover Air Force base. The ban was controversial. Many families of service people supported it because they felt that having media present, especially video and still photographers, would be an intrusion on their privacy. Other families advocated allowing pictures to document the sacrifice of the fallen. (The event is one now seen in fiction, as in the HBO movie "Taking Chance.")
Politically, the ban was perceived by opponents of the Iraq war as a way to hide the cost of the conflict from the American people. War supporters argued that the ban was more about respect for families. The new policy seems to be to allow families to state their preference concerning media presence. Complications that might arise will stem from the fact that often multiple coffins are...
In my Journalism Media & Ethics class we screened the HBO documentary "Ganja Queen," which told the story of a young Australian woman who was accused and then convicted of importing marijuana into Bali, Indonesia. The documentary raises a number of questions about the ethics of representation of true-life stories, especially in an age of online social-interactive media and "reality" television.
First, to what extent does a broadcaster or documentary filmmaker owe it to the audience to update knowledge about a subject? In this case, there have been numerous developments since the documentary was filmed, some of which probably would radically change the audience's perception of events.
Second, most ordinary people are not media-savvy in the sense of having the degree of self-awareness to know when something they are saying or doing looks wrong or suspicious on camera. Does a documentary filmmaker, especially in a criminal case, owe it to the subjects to help them be at their best for the camera, or is the goal to...
In class, I screened the HBO Documentary, The Trials of Ted Haggard, about the "fallen" evangelist. The documentary raises some major issues about media ethics.
1. To what extent should someone making a documentary explain the context of an event? For example, we really don't learn much about the pastor's settlement with his church.
2. When a documentary focusses on one person, should we not also learn about other key characters? There is no in-depth interview with the man who had relations with the pastor. He just states his position and that's that.
3. Does the documentary filmmaker need to tell us "what side" she is on: is she making the pastor look bad, or just letting him talk without a point of view?
Update on April 21, 2009
More on Pastor Ted's troubles.
Originally posted April 14, 2009 at PolicyByBlog...
David D. Perlmutter was not able to attend but his co-author (Monica Postelnicu, LSU) gave their presentation on "The Blogging of the President: How Online Social-Interactive Media Helped Obama Win" at the Broadcast Education Association 2009 meeting in Las Vegas.
Originally posted May 5, 2009 at PolicyByBlog...
David D. Perlmutter has been invited to write the chapter on "War and Visual Media" for the Encyclopedia of War.
Originally posted May 5, 2009 at PolicyByBlog...
David D. Perlmutter was a keynote speaker at the Kansas Governor's Public Health Conference in Wichita. His two topics were: "Marketing Health Information: The Challenge of Online Social-Interactive Media" and "How to Tell the Story of Your Success Via Online Social-Interactive Media"
Originally posted May 5, 2009 at PolicyByBlog...
David D. Perlmutter and Tom Johnson (Texas Tech) will be co-editors of a special issue of the academic journal Mass Communication and Society on "New Media in the 2008 Presidential Election."
Originally posted May 5, 2009 at PolicyByBlog...
David D. Perlmutter was a guest on the Jeremy Taylor Show on 1320am (KLWN) radio in Lawrence. He spoke about Facebook and other social media.
Originally posted May 5, 2009 at PolicyByBlog...
My second week of work over--time flies! I am now a professor & Starch Faculty Fellow and director of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication and The University of Iowa.
Some local reports:
http://www.news-releases.uiowa.edu/2009/april/040809perlmutter_director.html
http://www.dailyiowan.com/2009/04/09/Metro/10968.html
http://www.corridorbiznews.com/aspx/NewsDetail.aspx?ItemID=1664
And an interview by a student for his newsblog:
http://johngoodlove.blogspot.com/2009/05/interview-with-daniel-perlmutter.html
Originally posted July 3, 2009 at PolicyByBlog...