Archive
27 Jun

Turning the page: saying farewell and hello to changing ethics editors

<p>After more than four years overseeing the Ethics section of J-Source, Ivor Shapiro is stepping down. We welcome Romayne Smith Fullerton with <a href="http://j-source.ca/article/j-sources-new-ethics-editor-doing-right-thing" target="_blank" rel="noopener">her first column today</a>.</p><p>Ivor's roots in J-Source are deep: he founded this very website in 2007 then a few years later, took over the Ethics section from Stephen Ward, who continues as a columnist. </p>

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27 Jun

J-Source’s new ethics editor on doing the right thing

<p>Do the right thing.</p><p>It sounds so simple, but like the 1989 Spike Lee movie from which this phrase came, doing the right thing is not always straightforward. And those twists and turns, to me, are what ethics is all about.</p><p>It’s the grey areas that are the most fertile:</p><p>How as a journalist do you do right by the children you want to name and identify in a story that makes clear their family subsists well below the poverty line?</p><p>How do you do right by the person charged with sexual assault by an accuser who is also known to police?</p>

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9 May

Media ethics as activism

<p><em>The current changes in journalism have brought many new ethical challenges, but they’re also changing the idea of ethics itself, according to <strong>Stephen J. A. Ward</strong></em><em>. </em></p><p>           </p>

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30 Apr

Has there been a shift in the way suicide is reported?

<p><strong style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 22px; ">By Melanie Coulson</strong></p>

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21 Mar

Of reporting Tori Stafford’s final day, news organizations take different approaches

<p><em>Let’s face it: There is no easy way to report on a trial in which the details of the rape and murder of eight-year-old Tori Stafford are given. <strong>Belinda Alzner</strong> looks at the history of the case, the dichotomy between the public's reaction to the coverage and news organizations' understanding of their duty to report it and explains how and why some organizations have decided to take different approaches to their coverage. </em></p><p> </p>

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29 Feb

Press Freedom: Who gives a damn, anyway?

<p><em>It’s been 30 years since Section 2(b) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms made a free press the law of the land. But, on the eve of a national conference to take stock of the state of press freedom in Canada, <strong>Ivor Shapiro</strong> sees more apathy than passion around the issue.</em></p><p> </p>

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27 Feb

NPR introduces new ethics handbook

<p>National Public Radio in the U.S. released its <a href="http://ethics.npr.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">new ethics handbook</a> late last week. The handbook is an updated version of NPR’s 2003 ethics code, and looked to address shortcomings in the code that had become apparent.</p>

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22 Feb

Challenging the way journalists report sexual assault

<p><em>Warning:  The following article contains disturbing details.  But should it? In the latest issue of the </em><a href="http://kjr.kingsjournalism.com/?p=9005" target="_blank" rel="noopener">King's Journalism Review</a><em>, <strong>Marie Hanifen </strong>explores the delicate balance required to report on sexual assault cases and the point at which including details becomes gratuitous. </em></p><p><img alt="" class="imagecache-large inline-image" src="http://j-source.ca/sites/www.j-source.ca/files/imagecache/large/images/mariesexassault.jpg" title="" /></p>

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20 Feb

Interviewing Children: Paul Benedetti’s Dilemma

<p><em>He understands why we do it, but <strong>Paul Benedetti</strong> is having second thoughts about the ethics of interviewing children and youth. Benedetti is an award-winning columnist for the Hamilton Spectator and program co-ordinator for the graduate program in Journalism at Western University. He’s struggling to put his finger on exactly what’s making him uneasy – but he says his sense of unease is growing.</em></p><p>Lately, I have grown increasingly uneasy about journalists’ use of children and youth in their stories.</p>

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18 Jan

Mommy bloggers and journalistic standards

<p><em>Mommy blogs have become monetized and it's not hard to see why: Brands embrace bloggers who promote their products, and many bloggers are only too happy to accept compensation to promote brands they were going to be writing about anyway. <strong>Ira Basen</strong> looks into issues of transparency, ethics and reader expectation that come with accepting payment or products in exchange for words. </em></p><div style="background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; "><p> </p>

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