Communication, Ethics, and Society - Research Paper Example

Communication, Ethics and Society Introduction The ethical dilemma or ethical question explored by this paper is that whether or not it is ethical for the media outlets comprise on their impartially or show ambivalence or oblivion towards being politically correct. This paper would explore and analyze the case of media coverage for Hurricane Katrina, which represents a case where media was faced with the above-mentioned dilemma. Discussion Context of the Case It has been over seven years when more than 1836 people lost their lives due to Hurricane Katrina and subsequent floods near the Gulf of Mexico. Other than the deaths, this disaster also caused massive property damage and caused mass scale human suffering, which was exacerbated with the inability of the government and other social service organizations to make haste in their relief efforts and broaden the scope of their activities. In the aftermath of the disaster, New Orleans remained the center of the media coverage, not only because of the level of devastation, which is still apparent from the scars left from high water level on the exterior of several abandoned buildings, but also because of the cultural and ethnic diversity of New Orleans. For most of its recent history, New Orleans has been seen as the Mecca for tourists and has remained famous for its flexibility in liquor laws, voodoo, and flair for jazz. Since the devastation left the locals without any means for communication, the media agencies became the source for not only reporting the information, but also for deciding the context and interpreting the information (Cutter, et al., p. 15). Thousands of poor African Americans who found themselves isolated on the patches of dry land, stranded on the rooftops, seeking shelter in the Superdome and Convention Centre without any food or shelter became the center of the media coverage. The media did not waste any time in showing the bloated corpses that were floating in the water-filled streets of New Orleans (Cutter, p. 85). Much of the media controversy emerged primarily because of the language used by media outlets when covering this event. During the first few days of the disaster, almost all of the media outlets referred to the individuals as “refugees”. However, many critics did not receive the use of this term well because it was uncommon for media outlets to use this term for citizens of the United States living within the United States. Subsequently, many news organizations made formal announcements that they would cease to use this term and would use “victims”, “survivors”, and “evacuees” when referring to these people (Cutter, et al., p. 15). Values and Principles Involved in the Case Nevertheless, somewhere during media coverage, the media representatives changed their focus from gaining sympathy for the wounded and the dead to painting a picture of civil unrest and lawlessness through labeling the disaster victims as heinous criminals and opportunistic thieves. After a few days of Hurricane Katrina, the headlines from the national newspapers were branding the low-income class African Americans as “The Lowest form of Human Beings haunting the Earth” (Vedantam & Allison, Sec A). The media has an implicit responsibility of being impartial and unbiased; something that they use to convince their viewers about their credibility and reliability. The media has a massive impact over the perceptions and viewpoints of people and it is their duty to separate facts from opinions so that the people could formulate their own opinions. Pros and Cons of the possible decisions Dyson agrees that the media, regardless that whether it was done consciously or unconsciously played a crucial role in convincing the masses that the majority of the African Americans in these areas were criminals and inhumane savages. In fact, the author also argues that the inability of government in making haste to provide relief has a bidirectional cause and effect relationship with the media portrayal of the African Americans in New Orleans not as victims but as savages and criminals (p. 95). When media shows irresponsibility and bias within its coverage, it ends up having devastating impact on the party that is being presented in bad light. In the case of Hurricane Katrina, it was primarily due to this racist media coverage that New Orleans, rather than being considered as a disaster stricken city, became a prison city. The law enforcement agencies assumed the responsibility of preventing any supplies from entering the city and any victims from leaving the city. The media coverage led the people of the US, policymakers and the international world to believe that the true nature of humans and the inevitable “one against all and all against one” kind of war, as argued by Thomas Hobbes who best summarizes the situations of New Orleans and the Gulf of Mexico. It was primarily because of this belief that the lawmakers within the state of Louisiana had to treat New Orleans and adjoining areas as crime zone. When the then Louisiana’s Governor, Kathleen Blanco, dispatched the National Guard troops, she also sent a message to the “hoodlums” that the troops are capable of killing and shooting people and they would not refrain from doing the same if they find any attempts being made at breaking the law (Stivers, p. 50). The media and the journalists have to understand that their responsibility does not remain limited to their shareholders, but they have a moral and ethical responsibility towards the society. The media informs people, educates them, engages them in debates and discussions, and shapes their opinions, perceptions, and viewpoints. The failure at correctly doing the same has far-reaching consequences, not for the individuals, shareholders and the corporation, but also for the society and the coming generation. For example, several studies have revealed that there is bidirectional causation between the media stereotyping black youths with criminal acts and black youth committing those offences. Therefore, the more media portrays African Americans with the commonly held stereotypes, the greater is the possibility that the young African Americans would learn from the same and reinforce those stereotypes through their actions. Therefore, it is a downward spiral and media should step up and break this downward spiral as it is an important stakeholder in the American society. On the other hand, it is important here to note is that it was because of the strong words used by media outlets that the internal and external rescue agencies were able to grasp the criticalness of the threat and urgency of the situation. Had they merely reported the facts, the world would not have been able to witness such swift and strong response from the federal and non-governmental agencies (Tierney, et al., p. 60). External Factors and Previous Examples Sommers et al (pp. 39-55) closely examined this issue through conducting a Google News search where they focused on all the stories that appeared within first fifteen days. As mentioned earlier, at the beginning of the coverage, the news outlets relied heavily on the use of the term “refugees”, but they stopped doing this during second half of the period. The search unveiled 3870 stories, out of which 2830 stories focused on the use of the term “evacuee”, and 1040 stories referred to these people as “refugees”. Nevertheless, “evacuee” appeared to be the more widely used word by a ratio of 2.7 to 1. The researchers do realize that the unprecedented nature of Hurricane Katrina makes it troublesome to conduct any comparisons, however, Hurricane Rita, which hit the Gulf of Mexico three weeks after Katrina, allows the most room for such a comparison. A similar news search for Hurricane Rita uncovered 1767 stories, out of which 1510 used “evacuee” and only 257 news stories relied on the use of the word “refugee”. Although, the study is attempting to point out the apparent racial discrimination within the media coverage of Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita, considering the racial makeup of the areas that it influenced, there is a possibility that the media outlets might be taking a more cautious approach during their coverage of Hurricane Rita. When Hurricane Rita appeared on the scene, the media outlets were still battling from the controversy generated through their use of the term “refugee” and might have decided to limit the use of this term to avoid any further controversy (Elliott and Jeremy, p. 297). Nevertheless, the most important question is that whether or not the language used to describe the victims was influenced by their race. Nunberg (2005) provides conclusive evidence in this regard through examining the Nexis wire service articles that appeared in the news within a seven-day period after Katrina. This research found out that 56 percent of the articles used the term “evacuee” as compared to the 44 percent usage of the term “refugee”. Therefore, it was a 1.3 to 1 ratio, which is much lower than the other estimates, primarily, because of the change in search engines and period. More importantly, this study also found out that when the term “evacuee” or “refugee” appeared within a distance of 10 words of “poor” and “Black”, the probability of using the word “refugee” was 68 percent. Furthermore, two photographs that showed similar situations of people swimming through waters with food had different captions of “finding food” and “looting food” because the former depicted a white couple and the latter showed a black person. Quite clearly, these results make it apparent that the race did play a significant role in the media coverage of Hurricane Katrina and racial bias did distort the coverage of journalists and media outlets, which in turn, provided a distorted perception of the event (Cutter, p. 85). Important here to understand is the fact that the media had an implicit moral and ethical responsibility of performing the reporting of the news coverage with a colorblind approach that could provide information to the masses and force the policymakers to make haste in providing relief to these people. However, they allowed their biases to cloud their reporting, which caused an uproar amongst the critics (Stivers, p. 50). News channels are essentially profit maximizing corporations that are constantly seeking for ways, which could allow them to generate the maximum possible returns for their shareholders. The media was faced with the same dilemma during its coverage of Hurricane Katrina. When all of the media outlets were covering the same events and providing the same news, the media outlets and journalists feared they might fail in generating the maximum possible interest from this event. Floods, relief efforts, deaths, and property loss had become too conventional and the journalists wanted to ensure they could stir up events through providing a new dimension to this event. Therefore, rather than portraying the New Orleans as a town in need of help, the media outlets, after observing the predominant African American population within the victims, began to portray New Orleans as a city taken hostage by thugs and savages. Quite understandably, that created uproar amongst the masses but more importantly, it ensured that the people did not lose their interest in this event, something that benefited the news organizations. As mentioned earlier, the mere thought of Hobbesian type civil war breaking in New Orleans was enough to ensure prolonged interest in the story. However, it was towards the end when the dust settled that sources confirmed exaggeration of the “lawlessness” and “chaos” within the city. Furthermore, it was primarily because of this new coverage of New Orleans that the policymakers and law enforcement agencies entered the city with the mindset of preventing a civil war rather than providing relief to the citizens that have been hit with one of the worst disasters in the recent American history. Stakeholders More importantly, such instances of irresponsible media coverage end up impacting people from all groups. A study, which was conducted immediately after Hurricane Katrina revealed the differences in the perceptions and interpretations of the event between people from different ethnicities. For example, the research revealed that only 20 percent of the European Americans believed that had all the victims of Hurricane Katrina been White, the response from the government would have been much faster; whereas, roughly 60 percent of the African Americans agreed to this statement. Furthermore, slightly over 71 percent of African American of the respondents believed that Hurricane Katrina shows that racial inequality is still a critical issue but only 32 percent of the European Americans appeared to agree with the same statement (Adams, et al., p. 216). In addition, the journalists and news editors remain the most important stakeholders of the situation. Perhaps, the most important lesson from the news coverage of Hurricane Katrina for journalists and media outlets is that before reporting information, it is imperative for them to explore and examine their personal biases. There is no doubt that people are subjective beings with their biases, predispositions, assumptions and presuppositions and most of the times, these are subconscious, which means that the person himself or herself is not aware of these biases and prejudices. It is highly likely that the same was the case with the reporters that covered the event of Hurricane Katrina. It is an open secret that racial inequality exists in almost all aspects of the American life and that even the most progressive sectors of the society share some of the biases against African American and other minority ethnicities of the society. Research reveals that while white males are five times more likely to be found engaged in drug use, black men are several times more likely to be arrested for the same. Furthermore, it is also troublesome for African Americans to find employment and claim the same level of income as compared to their equally qualified white counterparts. The racial bias of the media also surfaced with the exaggeration of the “violent crime wave” which was reported in the news. As mentioned throughout the paper, the media reported property crimes, rapes, sexual assaults, robberies, lootings, thefts, child molestation, breaking and entering, assault and battery, murders, and several other crimes. However, the investigation conducted later revealed that the same some of these crimes never occurred and when they did, their presence was greatly overestimated. When the media (Elliott and Jeremy p. 297) reported forty dead bodies, the guards were only able to find nine dead bodies only and only one of them showed signs of murder. When the media outlets continued to report several cases of rapes, the law enforcement agencies were only able to find one case of rape. Nevertheless, in many cases, most of the rapes go unreported and undetected, but the media did create an extensive hype about the sexual assaults. Concluding Ethical Judgment Right from the first week of media coverage of Katrina victims, it became apparent that the journalists and news media were willing to reinforce the traditional stereotypes associated with African Americans on the victims of the disaster, majority of which were African Americans. Even today, critics cite the media coverage of Hurricane Katrina as the evidence of widespread racism present in the American society. Although, the evidence for racial bias is not irrevocably conclusive, it is strong enough to consider the possibility of racism within media and its reinforcement of stereotypes. Nevertheless, the media outlets and journalists have to comprehend the fact that they have an ethical and moral responsibility to ensure that their biases and presumptions are not reflected in their reporting. It must be acknowledged that it is a troublesome task, but this is what is expected out of the news organizations since this is what they promise. It is also important here to acknowledge that the reporters found themselves in a conflicting situation, where they had to report the news as quickly as possible and at the same time, censor the same for politically incorrect information. Quite clearly, they allowed the former to take precedence over the latter, something that caused backlash from the public. There are no doubts in the fact that the media does not only provide information to the public but it also plays a pivotal role in shaping the perceptions of the public. For example, during the Vietnam War, it was the approach taken by the media outlets to report the war stories, which influenced significantly the public opinion regarding the Vietnam War. During the early 1960s, the media supported the war and showed stories glorifying the American stance and American soldiers. However, within a few months, for several reasons, the American media began to move away from the traditional patriotic and nationalistic coverage of the news and tried to explore the other side of the picture. They began to propagate the fact that the American losses were great, they were being brutal and inhumane in their treatment of opponents, collateral damage was greater than expected, and that the U.S. forces had failed to make significant achievements in these years. The same led to a shift in public opinion about their approval of the Vietnam War and this shift in public opinion forced the policymakers to reconsider their stance (Cutter, p. 85). Such is the power of the media that it can shape the course of debates, policies, and public opinion. However, the fact is that when one is in a position of power and authority, he or she cannot escape the responsibility, which comes along with the power. With the immense power and authority of media, it also has to face the massive responsibility of being accountable, in front of not only its shareholders and regulatory authorities, but also to the general public and external stakeholders. Humans are subjective beings with several biases and predispositions. It is almost impossible for someone to claim that he or she is free from external and historical influence. In fact, the environment plays an important role in shaping the opinions and viewpoints of people regarding several issues. This explains why interpretivists argue that no knowledge possess, gained or transferred by human beings can be cited as absolute truth or accurate because humans have the tendency of corrupting the information with their personal biases (Elliott and Jeremy p. 297). The journalists, editors, reporters and other people working in news organizations who ensure the transfer the information to the public are also humans and eventually, their subjectivity is likely to influence their decisions. However, as media outlets, they regularly promise their viewers to provide them with unbiased and impartial news, which would depict both sides of the story. The media outlets and journalists should also understand that their news coverage has far-reaching impact on the society. Any attempts made at reinforcing the stereotypes for African American population would result in the African American reinforcing those stereotypes with their actions. Furthermore, the media should also acknowledge that the United States has spent several years battling with racism and still structural racism is apparent in the American Society. Education, unemployment, health, income, infrastructure, opportunities, savings, infant mortality rate and several other metrics and variables show the disadvantaged scenario faced by the African American population. In an environment, where the African Americans have a long list of justified grievances, it is an implicit ethical and moral responsibility of the media to ensure that they show the utmost level of sensitivity to race and culture during their coverage. Furthermore, even in the era of instant breaking news, the media outlets should ensure that they set up strong check and balance points to censor the information that goes to the public. Works Cited Adams, G, O’Brien, L. T., & Nelson, J. C. (2006). Perceptions of racism in Hurricane Katrina: A liberation psychology analysis. Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, Volume 6, No. 1, pp. 215-235. Cutter, S. L., Emrich, C. T., Mitchell, J. T., Boruff, B. J., Gall, M., Schmidtlein, M. C. & Melton, G. (2006). The long road home: Race, class, and recovery from Hurricane Katrina. Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development, Volume 48, No. 2, pp. 8-20. Cutter, Susan. (2005). "The geography of social vulnerability: Race, class, and catastrophe. Understanding Katrina: Perspectives from the social sciences. Dyson, Michael Eric. (2010). Come hell or high water: Hurricane Katrina and the color of disaster. ReadHowYouWant. Elliott, James R., and Jeremy Pais. (2006). Race, class, and Hurricane Katrina: Social differences in human responses to disaster." Social Science Research, Volume 35, No. 2, 295-321. Nunberg, G. (2005). When words break down. Retrieved October 10, 2005, from http://www-csli.stanford.edu/∼nunberg/looting.html Sommers, S. R., Apfelbaum, E. P., Dukes, K. N., Toosi, N., & Wang, E. J. (2006). Race and media coverage of Hurricane Katrina: Analysis, implications, and future research questions. Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy. Volume 6, No. 1, pp. 39-55. Stivers, Camilla. (2007). So Poor and So Black: Hurricane Katrina, Public Administration, and the Issue of Race." Public Administration Review. Volume 67, 48-56. Vedantam, S., and Allison Klein. (2005). “You wonder why it didn’t kill a million; officials upbeat in view of what might have been as survivors recount horror of what is,” The Washington Post, Sec A. Read More