In mid-January this year, the Commission on Journalism Ethics, which actively cooperates with Kherson State University, presented its 3rd edition of the Workshop on Journalism Ethics.
To be honest, until now, we have not had to dive deeply into the topic of ethics, except in specific classes during our studies or when we participated in journalism workshops or competitions. However, we understand that we have to be held strictly accountable for gaps in ethics, so we decided to brush up on our knowledge by ordering a workshop from CJE.
Although the manual has only four chapters, their content is informative. Two of them cover more traditional journalism issues, namely the most common mistakes in ethics and aspects of gender equality and non-discrimination in the media.
The issue of fact-checking particularly attracted our attention on these pages, as it is an integral part of the work of a modern journalist.
‘This is the only way to resist fakes, disinformation and manipulation,’ is how the authors describe the importance of complying with the provisions of the Code of Journalistic Ethics on fact-checking and information reliability.
The publishers also focused on responsibility, which is the first thing a journalist should pay attention to when writing a story:
‘Journalists should remember that their responsibility to the audience increases during the war. And the price of not only inaccurate but also incorrectly presented information can be too high,’ these lines aptly describe the importance of this standard for any media professional.
Sexism, racism and other forms of discrimination in the media are signs of unprofessionalism and incompetence, and this applies not only to the media. A separate section is devoted to the basic rules of gender equality. The theses are accompanied by the necessary practical examples, which allow us to consider and analyse typical mistakes made by journalists of both national and regional publications.
The other two sections focus on more pressing issues of our time: war and artificial intelligence.
Although ‘war never changes’, we need to know how to cover it properly to avoid one-sidedness and subjectivity in the presentation of materials.
This section presents a glossary of terms where you can find detailed explanations of the concepts of ‘military’ and ‘war’, ‘conflict’ and ‘war’, and others. We were also interested in the advice on how to write about prisoners of war, wounded and dead people.
In our opinion, this is the most necessary section for us, because Kherson region is a frontline zone where hostilities are taking place every day and it is our duty to cover them objectively.
Artificial intelligence is currently a global trend, and the authors of the workshop did not ignore it either. The expediency of its use by journalists and how to ethically apply new technologies in practice are discussed in the last section of the workshop
Separately, almost half of the manual is occupied by appendices, which contain recommendations on various topics that are partially related to the above sections, but this does not affect their importance, as there are also many aspects that every media professional should know.
Overall, having read the book, we can say that it is exactly what our journalism students need. Brief, concise, clear - this is how we can describe the content of the manual.
Useful tips accompanied by relevant examples will allow you to analyse the situation in depth and comprehensively, draw conclusions and, most importantly, learn them.
If you want to learn more information, the authors have provided for this by adding qr-codes with links to videos, practical exercises, articles, etc.
Another advantage is the relevance of the information, as even more traditional topics are considered here through the prism of current events.
We can't single out the visuals separately - they are really simple but at the same time fascinating, demonstrating the daily work of journalists and, of course, examples of materials for analysis. The well-chosen colour palette of the manual is also pleasing to the eye.
To be honest, we did not find any disadvantages, the professionalism of the authors and publishers is really at the highest level, we thank our partners for the opportunity to dive deeper into the ethical component of journalism!
We highly recommend that you read the electronic version of the workshop. We are sure that you will find a lot of useful information, even if you do not plan to connect your life with journalism.
The author are 3rd year student majoring in Journalism, Oleksandr Sipko.
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