ESPN reporter Britt McHenry was suspended for a week in 2015 after insulting a towing lot attendant. In a tweet, McHenry apologized for regrettable things she said, concluding that as frustrated as she was, she should have taken the ‘high road.’
In an intense and stressful moment, I allowed my emotions to get the best of me and said some insulting and (cont) http://t.co/Wx37XF2QtM
— Britt McHenry (@BrittMcHenry) April 16, 2015
But in the viral video that shows McHenry saying things like “I’m on television and you’re in a fucking trailer, honey,” the public sees McHenry on a high horse, not a high road, which earned her dozens of angry tweets.
According to the Ethical Journalism Network, a global journalism ethics coalition, there are five core principles of journalism: truth and accuracy; independence; fairness and impartiality; humanity; and accountability. The first three instruct journalists on how to report, but the last two hint at how they should behave as people and as professionals. In a society where distrust in the media continues its decades-long trend, journalists have pushed solutions that limit misinformation, advocate scrutiny and increase the quality of reporting. But what often remains on the back burner is something that fuels negative perceptions and distrust: journalists’ behavior.
In a 2013 Pew Research Center survey on how certain groups contribute to society, 28 percent of respondents said journalists contribute “a lot” to society, a 10 percent decrease from the 38 percent of respondents who said the same thing in Pew’s 2009 survey, and a third-to-last place standing, just above business executives and lawyers. A 2017 Pew survey on American attitudes toward the news media show that 11 percent of Republicans, 34 percent of Democrats and 15 percent of Independents trust the national news media “a lot.”
The “fake news” buzz and the rise of partisan news sources are part of why these attitudes persist and trust in the news media has eroded. However, how journalists behave also plays a role.
This is particularly true when it comes to covering tragedies, when journalists are often called insensitive, exploitative and vulture-like. As Poynter’s Indira Lakshmanan stresses, journalists will be criticized for reporting on catastrophes no matter how they do it. But EJN’s fourth core principle, humanity, makes clear that journalists must be aware of the impact their words and images will have on others.
For example, A CNN reporter was criticized for interviewing a woman in Houston where she and her daughter had found shelter during Hurricane Harvey. The mother, Danielle, lashed out at her. “Y’all sitting here, trying to interview people at their worst times, like that’s not the smartest thing to do.”
Woman cusses out CNN reporter in Texas:”Y’all trying to interview people during their worst times. Like that’s not the smartest thing to do” pic.twitter.com/MbZ3vMLtWs
— JM Rieger (@RiegerReport) August 29, 2017
The reporter apologized and many other journalists came to her defense, but this highlights how disaster reporting can be both chaotic and uncertain for journalists, and confusing and exploitative for victims, who are extremely vulnerable.
Another example is NBC’s “Today Show” interview with a survivor of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting. Samantha Grady had witnessed the shooting of her best friend. When asked how her friend was doing, Grady broke down, saying her friend didn’t make it.
This upset a lot of viewers who were confused as to why a teenager who has undergone so much trauma needed to be on national television.
While the interview was upsetting, NBC’s response was even more so: they didn’t apologize. “Sadly, the witnesses in horrific school shootings are mostly students, which is why we—and every other news organization—interview them as we report on these tragedies,” a network spokeswoman told the Washington Post in an emailed statement. Reporter Paul Farhi asked Bruce Shapiro, the executive director of the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma about the network’s response. “If the segment is ‘absolutely heartbreaking’ [as a tweet by NBC describes it] it is because Kotb and Guthrie were ignorant of her loss,” Shapiro said. “NBC should be apologizing for its mistake, not selling that girl’s tears like reality TV.”
These examples, and many others not cited here, show how the public may perceive the news media as exploitative and insensitive when reporting on tragedies. Telling these stories is important. According to the Society of Professional Journalists, tragedies have an impact on people and are the types of stories that should be reported as a living history of communities. It’s a journalist’s obligation to report news of tragedy and grief. However, with sensitive issues, journalists need to be even more sensitive in how they come across and be certain to minimize harm to all those involved.
The way journalists behave affects how journalism is trusted. If the public can’t relate to journalists, they’ll distrust. If they feel like journalists exploit them when things go wrong and are insensitive to their feelings, they’ll distrust. While there is no simple fix to regaining trust in the news media, reflecting on the way journalists behave, the way they interact with those they report on, may be a good place to start.
Maddie Vincent is an Environmental Science and Natural Resource Journalism graduate student at the University of Montana. She was born in Butte, Montana, but spent the majority of her childhood in Des Moines, Iowa. She’s a former UM women’s soccer player, rock band vocalist and high school band nerd.
