Media shackle
Published:Thursday | July 8, 2010 | 12:00 AM
The Editor, Sir:
A recent attack on a member of the press has heralded the annual debate on a media code of ethics/ behaviour for media practitioners. Coming from the press and media associations of Jamaica this has always been puzzling to say the least.
Media in Jamaica seem to be in retreat, announcing plans to police itself in the face of attacks on media personnel in the carrying out of their duties. In a time when freedom of the press is to be enhanced and defended, the media fraternity has resorted to self-imposed gagging. A free press is the bulwark of all democracies; truth is the only code required by media practitioners and there can be no sanitising it through any code of ethics.
Reporting the truth is the only end of good journalism even if the means employed by individual practitioners differ, as FOX News puts it "we report, you decide".
In the age of the high-speed Internet connection, dominated by YouTube, Facebook and search engines, underpinned by a free press, a code of ethics will only serve to shackle formal media, and with or without formal media, "the revolution will be televised and it will be no rerun, it will be live".
I am, etc.,
PHILLIP CHAMBERS