TASTE OR JUDGEMENT - A DISTRESS CALL

Some of you reading this article might find it distressing.

That’s a version of the kind of warning that many broadcasters use to preview graphic content.

Cynics see it as a major call to action – “Watch now!” but others, particularly parents of young children, may starting lunging for the remote.

The shooting dead of a journalist and a cameraman live on air on Wednesday morning in the United States put all the editorial challenges facing newsrooms into sharp focus.

It used to be a particular test for television news but now newspapers, radio stations, websites, apps and social media publishers are all able to both access and publish the pictures.

The immediate question about the Virginia shooting was what to publish but it soon became even more complicated. The gunman Bryce Williams – a former reporter at station WDJB – had taken his own footage and uploaded it to Twitter along with allegations about the station and the woman reporter he had just murdered. So not only were there considerations around taste and decency, there were also moral challenges about giving the murderer’s own content a platform.

The debate about the rights and wrongs of showing either the station’s footage or that of Williams immediately swung into action on social media before professional news managers had a chance to put out their own stories.

Some Twitterati urged their fellow Tweeters not to circulate the station’s unedited footage with exchanges ranging from sharp to downright abusive. The chorus of disapproval grew even louder when it became clear that the gunman had uploaded his own videos.

Some argued that it would encourage copycat responses while others said it would give the gunman the notoriety he was looking for (he eventually turned the gun on himself following a police chase). The micropublishers on social media platforms did as they saw fit depending on their take on the censorship issue but those with a professional responsibility to their viewers had to take a more considered view.  

News managers are often asked to make judgement calls on sensitive or graphic content. This can range from protocols about showing medical needles going into someone’s skin to close-up shots of decapitated bodies.

Different countries and cultures apply different standards. Here, traditional media would not show close-ups of dead bodies, severed limbs and body parts after an explosion, excessive blood or anything else which might be considered offensive or disrespectful to the dead. However, they might show a body in the distance or a body covered in a blanket. They might even consider showing a closer shot of death in the context of war or famine to illustrate the appalling consequences of the story they are reporting. Essentially it becomes a judgement call for news managers and despite these general guidelines, each one is made on a case by case basis.

A journalist’s natural instinct is to publish rather than censor. Facts and pictures – once verified – speak for themselves and any omissions corrupt the purity of the story. Against that, there are boundaries of taste and decency that mitigate against unedited content.

In the case of the Virginia shooting, CNN decided to broadcast the unedited live footage from WDJB once every hour with a warning ahead of it. The content was emotionally distressing but not as visually graphic as those who chose not to view it might have imagined.

BBC, ITV, RTÉ, TV3 and independent.ie all used footage that went to black when the shooting started while keeping the audio running before the pictures cut back to WDJB’s studio. RTÉ did not give a warning about distressing content on the Six One – TV3 did before its 5.30. TV3 chose to use footage from the gunman’s video on the 5.30 but RTÉ decided not to. Independent.ie put up a slate as the shooting started saying distressing images had been removed. The following morning some tabloid newspapers used stills of the shooting taken from footage that the television stations hadn’t shown.

The ethical question around showing the footage later released by the gunman was underlined when Twitter and Facebook blocked Williams’ account to prevent others from seeing it - although not before many of their users had captured the content.

When social media platforms first became established, their line was that they did not want to editorialise but inevitably they have been drawn into that area following the uploading of ISIS beheadings and the murder of fusilier Lee Rigby in London. Now social media businesses – for that’s what they’ve become - have evolved extensive policies and guidelines to protect their integrity and reputation.

When considering the suitability of footage, context can lead to apparent double standards. Arguably the deaths of JFK and Bobby Kennedy were more graphic in content visually than the deaths of the two people in Virginia but few would seek to censure those images in the context of historical documentary or analysis. Yet those same images could be extremely shocking for a small child who might happen across them on a television in someone’s living room.

Essentially the judgement call is made with the viewer in mind with regard to taste and decency, censorship and also the business risk of losing that part of the audience that might be alienated by graphic, visceral images. Timing can be another factor, not just for graphic images, but sexual content and language, with concerns about younger viewers watching earlier in the day.

In the final analysis the values of the news organisation and its relationship with its audience will prevail. Those viewers who are determined to see everything will always find an outlet somewhere on the web and for those who are offended by what is on the screen in front of them, there is always the off button.

Bob Hughes

@bobhughesnews

HEALTH IS WEALTH

Imagine your child is sick. Imagine you have no money to spare but you’re not going to take a risk with your child’s health. You take your child to the doctor and your child is treated for free.

Is this the dream of an ideologically-driven Minister for Health?

No, it was the reality of the British National Health Service fifty years ago. I was that child.

Growing up in the 60s in the UK, the only concern for both doctor and patient was the patient’s health. And if your child was really ill, the doctor would come to your house by appointment. For free.

When I came to Ireland in the 90s and visited the doctor with my own children, a cold shudder passed through my body as I fumbled for a cheque book or scrambled for some cash.

I thought:  “What if I couldn’t afford this?” Would I have taken the risk that it was “just another virus and antibiotics would be of no use anyway?” But then what if it wasn’t a virus? What if it turned out to be the onset of something more serious like meningitis and my dithering had jeopardised my child’s life?

The National Health Service in the UK was brought in by the post-World War Two Labour Government, a government that was elected on a social democratic tide that sought to implement the community spirit that had flourished during the war.

Churchill’s Tories – despite his service as a War Leader – were rejected in favour of a more egalitarian vision of society.

The post-war Government’s reforms in both health and education created improved opportunities for all, regardless of income, on the basis that these issues were fundamental rights in a mature democratic society.

To this day, the much maligned and undermined NHS - which experiences the same kind of challenges as the HSE - remains sacrosanct as a concept for the British electorate.

And despite the justified criticisms about its waste and inefficiency, it is telling that only 12 per cent of Britons choose private health care.

In the UK, there is no begrudgery that the rich have the same free access to health care as the less well-off, yet these arguments are put forward almost on a daily basis by critics of Leo Varadkar’s proposals for free GP care for children under six.

That’s because there’s an acceptance that if the rich are to pay more in taxes to subsidise UK Government services, it will be done by simpler tax models, rather than mean-spirited means tests that are hugely costly to administer.

The other bizarre argument against Varadkar’s initiative is that it will in some way penalise children over six who have serious conditions - and indeed all others with acute GP needs.

This narrow approach sees Government expenditure as compartmentalised and fixed. The available expenditure at the disposal of Governments rises and falls with every economic fluctuation and ministers have to make the case for the financial requirements of their departmental budgets. Do critics really imagine that if the Government’s proposals were not implemented that other areas of acute need would be better served?

Furthermore, it is important to remember that this is the first step in the Government’s policy to provide free GP access for all. The current proposals should be seen in that context.

Health is the most fundamental issue facing us all. It is about time it was put front and centre of public policy.

That is not to say that it should become a black hole into which resources are poured without proper supervision but it is to say that there are much bigger management issues that the Government should be held accountable for.

What if the chaos of Irish Water and its convoluted initiatives and reverses had been avoided? How much of that expenditure would have been better served had it been diverted to meet some of the financial challenges presented by our health care services?

It’s clear that there are a huge range of inadequacies and inequalities that need to be addressed in our health care system and arguments will rage over what the priorities should be and how much should be spent on them.

But is this hopeless and helpless hand-wringing about the monumental task ahead an excuse to make no progress at all towards a fairer system?

Bob Hughes is a journalist, writer and media consultant.

He was formerly Deputy Director of News at TV3 and a producer at Channel 4 News, Sky and Reuters.

Twitter: @bobhughesnews

MEETING OF MINDS?

The suggestion of a meeting is often met with much eye-rolling.

It is usually someone else’s agenda and not your own. You’re too busy but then again you have to be there… just in case.

And of course there is the performance aspect. Some colleagues will take the floor to parade their brilliance, others will “keep the head down” and congratulate themselves for having escaped from the blame games that are often played out.

But meetings have a point and a purpose and if only 20 seconds of vital information is elicited from a two-hour bore-fest, then the meeting should have been worth the effort.

Meetings can have many purposes – to plan, to review, to inform are just a few – but they should share the same goal – a positive outcome.

And that’s why – contrary to what it says – the Department of Environment should be concerned that there were no minutes for 13 out of the 23 high level meetings that Irish Water or rather its previous incarnation, Bord Gáis, held in 2012.

The department’s reason for its lack of concern over the details revealed in RTÉ’s This Week programme was that it was not involved in the meetings itself, although of course the department’s then minister, Phil Hogan, was in attendance for at least some of them.

But whether the department is right or wrong to be blasé about the meetings it was not directly involved in, it should have been in the interests of the participants themselves to have some meaningful records.

To use a broadcasting rule of thumb, most of us speak at a rate of three words per second. It doesn’t take a very long meeting to rack up a huge volume of words and how many people would be capable of emerging from a lengthy session with an exact record of all that was discussed in their head?

Effective meetings need minutes, whether the purpose is planning or imparting information. If a record of what has been discussed or agreed is there for all parties to see, then everyone can literally be on the same page. It’s also the only way to outfox the crafty operators that hear what they only want to hear and insist that matters were agreed to their satisfaction when everyone else’s recollection is somewhat different.

It’s hard to believe then that the meetings held by Bord Gáis that were undocumented were of such elementary content that minutes –or even follow-up e-mails – were not required so that all participants would be clear on the way forward

One excuse could have been that there wasn’t time for such care and attention but that’s hardly going to stand up in the wake of the debacle that’s ensued.

Another could be that the content of the meeting was commercially sensitive but that doesn’t work either because RTÉ’s Freedom of Information requests were refused on the basis of no minutes being kept rather than the sensitivity of their content.

That leaves us with on final excuse. That no-one wanted those discussions to find their way into the public domain. Surely not!

Bob Hughes is a journalist, writer and media consultant.

He was formerly Deputy Director of News at TV3 and a producer at Channel 4 News, Sky and Reuters.

Twitter: @bobhughesnews

GASPING FOR AIRTIME

Every broadcaster listening to Terence Flanagan’s catastrophic interview with Mary Wilson on RTE’s Drivetime would have been thinking two things – firstly, “It could have been me” and secondly, “I hope I don’t get one of those interviews.”

Yes, live radio can be daunting but there are plenty of things that can be done to stave off disaster.

In fairness to Mary Wilson, she decided not to fillet the poor unfortunate Terence when others may have easily done so. Nevertheless, it was shocking that a TD of nearly eight years’ experience should have been so ill-prepared.

In many ways, the decision by Wilson not to go for the jugular – he is after all a leading light in a shiny new party – made it even more embarrassing. Pity is often more powerful than opprobrium.

Flanagan himself should have realised that he would be in trouble. Either he was so distracted by something of such greater import that he couldn’t think or he really was totally unprepared.

There certainly seems to be little evidence of prep work. All the key questions likely to be posed should have been anticipated and rehearsed. Clever broadcasters are always trying to wrong-foot politicians with that “killer question”.

The good ones often succeed but there are plenty of ways for an interviewee to buy him or herself brain time with waffle and obfuscation. It might make for a dull interview if it’s allowed to go on but at least it’s a get-out-of-jail card. God knows we see enough evidence of it on almost daily basis.

That Renua should have failed to put its leading lights through their paces before “going live” on launch day is hard to believe because it was as big a fail moment for the party as it was for Terence Flanagan.

The excruciating three minutes and twenty two seconds did a lot to damage the slickness of the Lucinda launch. The smart professional with bright new ideas standing alongside her economics guru had been neatly packaged by policy director Ross McCarthy and marketing expert Noel Toolan.

It made for a strong image. Unfortunately the Flanagan interview exposed the shallowness of Renua’s political communications’ well.

In many respects, Flanagan started off in true spin doctor style. Instead of answering the first question about how Renua differed from Fine Gael, he started to talk about the day being a historic one and then went into the usual blather about a fresh start with open government and keeping promises.

Ironically he more or less answered the question because the blather was the same pitch given by Fine Gael before – and shortly after – the last election.

All the questions that followed could have been anticipated by any experienced political journalist-turned-handler, yet there were no answers forthcoming and Wilson had to resort to prompting her guest in a bid to stem the awkward silences.

The interviewed faltered and faltered until it eventually ran out of steam and Wilson – out of kindness or resignation – gave up.

Some will feel sorry that Terence Flanagan was placed in such a highly vulnerable position. Others will feel that as a seasoned politician pitching for Government he should have been much more able to articulate his vision.

But maybe the blame for the travesty should be reserved for those that allowed him to be exposed in that way without the proper support. After all, isn’t support what parties are all about?

Bob Hughes is a journalist, writer and media consultant.

He was formerly Deputy Director of News at TV3 and a producer at Channel 4 News, Sky and Reuters.

Twitter: @bobhughesnews

NOT JUST ONE OF THE LADS

The Jeremy Clarkson “fracas”- as he terms it himself - has ignited a debate over what it means to be “one of the lads”.

Laddishness, it would now seem, means entitlement, arrogance and an acceptance of casual racism and sexism. Ageism may also be included as a form of agreed self-deprecation for the older “lads”, who style themselves as grumpy old men.

It may also mean the ability to throw a punch, something yet to be determined in the exchanges between Clarkson and producer, Oisin Tymon, but evidently factually accurate in the presenter’s historical fisticuffs with the equally boorish Piers Morgan.

Clarkson’s entertainment factor relies on his blunt and often witty putdowns of both people and machines, remarks delivered with the laconic air of the seasoned cynic who can only escape the drab normality of life by taking charge of large engines and driving at speed.

Some may see this as the ultimate form of thrill-seeking, others may view it as a type of penile dementia.

Most of the time it seems like harmless fun but there’s an insidious undercurrent to the Clarkson persona that permits others to behave in the same way.

It’s the same kind of peer pressure that anticipates all male gatherings will be beer-swilling exhibitions of vulgarity with nights-out ending in drunken sexual escapades or fights in the street. It’s life for the Inbetweeners that never grew up.

Of course this is a grotesque characterisation of the traditional male night out but how many men find themselves listening uncomfortably to the kind of “banter” that would not be acceptable in any other context.

The common get-out clause is that it’s just male bravado and that it is not meant to be serious.  Celebrities like Clarkson are offered other exemptions.

One of the most odious aspects of the current argument over the presenter’s future is the idea that his “value” to the BBC should excuse or override the kind of behaviour that might lead lesser mortals to instant dismissal.

Another is that the BBC has failed to develop the correct strategic policies in managing “talent”. Again, this view sets the “talent” apart from the also-rans and suggests that those who enjoy the privileges of fame and fortune are somehow allowed to break those petty little rules that the rest of us must adhere to.

Clarkson is lucky to have survived his past brushes with controversy, including his inappropriate use of an offensive nursery rhyme and his provocative behaviour in Argentina. Nevertheless he is entitled to due process.

The BBC disciplinary panel that will be chaired by the Head of BBC Scotland, Ken McQuarrie is now under way but there is currently no deadline for its conclusion. Hopefully the facts will be established and any consequent actions will be taken on the basis of the evidence alone.

Clarkson has opted for gallows humour, comparing himself to a dinosaur that has had its day. This apparently fatalistic approach may be the words of someone who thinks he is either too valuable to lose or too enticing a prospect for other broadcasters looking for a new cash cow.

Whatever the outcome of the BBC inquiry, it’s unlikely that we’ll have seen the last of Jeremy Clarkson.

Bob Hughes is a journalist and media consultant.

He was formerly Deputy Director of News at TV3 and a producer at Channel 4 News, Sky and Reuters.

Twitter: @bobhughesnews