The Guwahati incident shows that journalists do not always adhere to the ethical standards of behaviour that they demand of others
I remember watching “The Death of Kevin Carter: Casualty of the Bang Bang Club,” an American documentary about the suicide of South African photojournalist Kevin Carter, at a film festival organised by my law school in 2010. The documentary that was nominated for the Academy Awards depicts the gut-wrenching tale of Carter’s enduring depression by the carnage he witnessed as a photographer in warzones.
In 1993, Carter took a trip to Sudan. There he saw a little girl, bent over with hunger and dehydration, eyed by a nearby vulture. Careful not to disturb the vulture, he waited for 20 minutes until the vulture was close enough, positioned himself for the best possible image, fixed his frame and shot.
The photo won him the 1994 Pulitzer Prize. At a conference, he was asked what happened to the girl. He didn’t know. Didn’t he do anything to help her? No. Carter came under heavy criticism for just photographing — and not helping — the little girl. Two years later, heavily disturbed by the incident, Carter committed suicide.
The documentary poses a moral dilemma. I was left asking myself — how many journalists would frighten away the vulture and help the child? How many would take the photograph? Witnessing the outrage against the journalist who shot the Guwahati molestation video, my mind wandered back to Kevin Carter. Should journalists put the camera down and help or should they remain objective observers?
Despite an increasing concern that many, including the Chief Minister of Assam, have expressed about the ethical obligation of the Guwahati journalist, there are others who remain extremely sceptical. Mr. Raghu Rai, India’s noted photojournalist, expressed solidarity for the journalist by commenting that a journalist’s only job is to report the story. He said that professionally speaking, journalists have to cover such things, no matter how distasteful.
Little time for reflection
Strong arguments can be made in support of Mr. Rai’s position. Journalism perhaps requires a certain clinical detachment from and disregard for some of the ethical niceties and sensitivities of everyday life. Moreover, journalism often requires rushed thinking and action, leaving little time for deep reflection. Further, by taking the video of the girl, that communicated an utter state of horror and despair, the journalist made a larger comment about the situation of women in India and helped promote the important debate on safety of women in our cities.
Interestingly, many years ago, Martin Luther King gave similar advice to a photographer from Life Magazine, who on seeing small children being shoved to the ground by policemen, stopped taking pictures and went to their aid. Ron F. Smith’s book on journalism and ethics mentions King’s statement to the photographer — “The world doesn’t know this happened, because you didn’t photograph it. I’m not being cold-blooded about it, but it is so much more important for you to take a picture of us getting beaten up than for you to be another person joining in the fray.”
So, what does the outrage against the Guwahati journalist tell us? Is it merely a case of people, far away from danger, from their living rooms, claiming the position of superiority? Or is it necessary for media persons to reflect upon this incident to enable them to clarify their intuitions, concepts and beliefs regarding journalistic and media practices?
On a basic level, the entire incident raises the bigger question of motivation behind telling a story. Here, I make the normative claim (and I am no journalist) that a journalist’s motivation should always be to tell the story at a deeper level than what has actually happened. The guiding force behind reporting facts should be to focus on the deeper reasons behind the issue.
Was the manner in which the girl’s private grief, impotence, and despair put on display for all viewers, without her consent and regardless of any sympathy in consonance with this deeper motivation? In the very act of deploring the tragedy, the underlying motivation behind the Guwahati video seems to be an appalling curiosity and morbid delight in the tragedies of others. And, therein lies the problem. In fact, such depiction is routine in the media. We have seen in the past journalists asking someone whose friends or parents have been killed in a plane crash “how they feel”!
On rightness
Although most journalists would consider it to be their professional duty to catch such events on tape and later put them up for display, journalistic professionalism need not come apart from ethical responsibility. As Oakley and Cocking claimed in regard to virtue ethics and professional roles, “goodness is prior to rightness” — (Oakley, J. & Cocking, D. (2001), Virtue ethics and professional roles). Rightness, properly understood, can only be derivative of goodness, insofar as what is right must be based on what is valuable in regard to certain notions of the good.
Similarly, journalistic rightness needs to be understood in the larger context of the role the media plays in our society. Given that the news media's function, at least in part, is to seek out and expose wrongdoing, it had better not be guilty of the very same sins it exposes in others if it is to avoid the charge of hypocrisy. That is, journalists and the news media must themselves consistently aim to respect the very same ethical standards of behaviour that they demand others should adhere to. A proportionate response in the Guwahati case would have been to focus only on the wrongdoer’s faces in the video, and try to protect the girl by either volunteering assistance or immediately informing the police.
I am not denying that probably many critics of media practices (including me) may possess only a superficial grasp of the realities of journalistic and media practices. Hence media criticism and ethical debate tends to contradict the complex cases and dilemmas that actually arise. But this is not to deny the point and purpose of critical reflection. Undoubtedly, it is the job of the journalists to depict and report facts as they happen. But, in doing so, they should not lose sight of the bigger question — what is their investment as human beings? Shouldn’t journalists be defined by who they are intrinsically, rather than what they do?
Kevin Carter ended his life grappling with the same questions.
(Karan Singh Tyagi is an associate attorney at an international law firm in Paris.)
Keywords: Guwahati molestation case, media ethics, Guwahati molestation video, Kevin Carter, Sudan girl vulture photo
As a reporter it is necessary to shoot the incident. But shooting the
incident for 1-2 min is enough to tell the world what had happened.
After that 1-2 min shooting, he should have helped her. By doing this
way he would have gained a lot of respect from the people.
The Guwahati incident cannot be compared with the case of Kevin Carter
as the author has done in this article. Its cheese and chalk
comparison.Kevin Carter may have died by the ethical-moral dilemma a
journalist suffers only when he/she is objective, impartial and
detached from the event he/she is covering. But the Guwahati incident
is something totally different. Here the reporter participates in the
name of covering the event. Instigates the mob, shoots the whole
incident for 45 long minutes never bothering to inform the police. The
video footage nowhere shows that the reporter concerned is bothered
about the poor girl's humiliating experience of being stripped on a
public place. The reporter seems to be enjoying the incident as mush
as the wolfish mob. His channel telecasts the event showing the girl
in poor light and projecting themselves as moral police of the
society. Such a despicable case in which the reporter stoops so low
cannot be compared with Kevin Carter.
I understand, on first attempt to realize the situation that teenage girl was in, it
seems like capturing the hedious molestation in a video, was rather a matter of
double victimization for the girl. The journalist has even resigned after being heavily
criticized, but its for everyone to understand that footage was very important deal,
for it was broadcasted all over India and carried a wave of rage all over nation,
which is the need of the hour. Question is why do people, the public stands and
spectates? We are usually more in number? We are we isolated with our own society,
governed by us? How could it be easier to kills your conscience, stand and do
nothing about the evil acts? Doesn't this boil our blood? How can we be okay with it?
If someone was making video why didn't the spectators stopped the journalist from
capturing this and came to rescue the girl? '
This is paradoxical, there is the need to expose the tendency of men
viewing women as mere objects of pleasure(rightness) and also the urgent
need to save the girl(goodness). Goodness would have won any day, hands
down. BUT WHO WILL TELL THE STORY THEN ?
The journalist who shot the crime no doubt might have later admitted
that what ever has happened was wrong and a heinous display of humanity.
Humanity becomes just another style statement which sounds like a
fantasy to me that people like to talk and endorse but not work it out
in reality!!. And I regret that.
How nonsensical can this be? Why is this stuff printed in The Hindu?
Don't you know that the journalist planned and directed this incident?
Seriously the Hindi should consider its own media ethics.
Why does the media always try to protect its own? You are trying to
downplay the role of the journalist who instigated and perhaps even
directed this incident (according to the victim and other accused).
What the Guwahati incident shows is that there is no low below which
Indian journalism will not sink - the journalist didn't just call in
the camera - he encouraged the crowd to molest and strip the girl -
his close friend Amar jyoti kalita with whom he hatched the plan are
the principal culprits. Initially, the incident was presented by the
local channel as a moral policing affair- "drunk girl publicly shamed,
beaten and handed over to the police" - it is only after the national
outrage that the girl was projected as the victim. What this incident
shows is the dark side of the media revolution in India. Its a shame
and a pity that so few journalists have the courage to tell the truth
in our country.
The journalist did a commendable job in capturing the incident on the
video. The story was aired at first as morality ode where a group of
self appointed moral guardians beat up a group of supposedly low moral
standards because they went to a bar. We definitely don't know whether
the cameraman had the same opinion or not. Though most of the
journalists, whether they are editors or rookie journalists, have a
mindset rooted in the decayed Victorian era attitudes since they were
grown up in such a system. Very few can come out of such a mentality
and that too will take time.
It's strange to expect ethich from any Indian citizen, leave alone the journalist. When somoene is uffering in the middle of the road, indians will bypass him and even won't try to offer any help. Until and than we as a society changes a whole lot you can't expect ethich from anyone including my profession, which is the medical, where ethics is more important than in other profession.
In such cases a journalist should be considered involved and supporting the incident.Humanity comes first and duty later because humanity is innate.There are instances where people have killed somebody in front of the journalist taking pictures.As Vijaykumar has rightly said would the journalist been a silent spectator if his kith and kin was involved in such an incident.
A good article. Perhaps sometimes photo-journalists sometimes have to
face such tricky situations. He has to do justice to both the roles of
his, a journalist as well as human being. Somebody asked, what he would
have done if his own daughter had been involved. As a father, not just
as a human being, he would rush to the rescue of his daughter. But at
other times as journalist he has to shoot for a minute or two, long
enough to identify the culprits and inform the world, and then call the
police and finally do whatever he can to save the victim.
The Journalist in Question who shot the "ugly" pictures in Guwahati had done his job for what he was being paid by his bosses. It was because of him the handlers of such a gruesome incident could be identified and put them behind the bars. No matter how unpleasant the scenes were, the Journalist needs to be applauded for his work.
The journalist capturing the incident is good and because of that we
have realised the safety of women in the society. But will that be
enough to capture just the video? Is nt he having any responsibility of
saving a fellow being from such incidents? Is he shooting a big length
movie or what. He should have captured the incident in short time and
then tried to save that girl in which case the girl would have been
saved from much embarrassment. My point is he could have done both duty
as a journalist and responsibility as a citizen in which he failed as a
citizen and overdone as journalist
"journalists have to cover such things, no matter how distasteful". Would the Journalist still have shot the video had his sister or wife been in that situation? The answer is a big no. It is ok to take the video for few seconds or a minute. However, in this case, it seems that the video was not taken to bring this crime to public but for something else.
In a moment when there is not much time for reflection,the course of
action to be taken by an individual should better be judged by "Shreya"
(good for all)rather than "Preyo"(favourable).With application of this
concept one can get guidance in a critical moment as faced by Kevin
Carter and the Guwahati journalist. Unfortunately our generations are
completely detached from wisdom our land generated thousands of years
ago.
I personaly feel, shoot it after raising an alarm to public/police. Its always has very minimal reaction time to decide what is right to do at these moments.
i think there needs to be a boundary between professional rules and morals.it must be on the sole discretion of the journalist to choose his way.both options have pros and cons...it depends on us how to find the middle way
clicking/ shooting an incident is different. in guwahati case, the journalist was involved in instigating the mob to molest the girl, because just a few minutes ago she didn't give in to his intentions. this journalist works for a tv channel, which is practically owned by a minister currently in power. so in reality, they are misusing the power in the name of so and so politician, which cannot be accepted at all.
The journalist did the right thing. Without him, the ugly side would
not have been revealed. Just imagine a counter-factual situation in
which the journalist had rushed to fight so many men. Not only would
he have been most probably roughed up, but the perpetrators would
never be punished, courtesy our great police and the slow moving
justice system.
It's very easy to point a finger at the journalist, but in such
situations, it is not possible to act with arithmetic precision. Your
instinct takes over. You make a split second judgement and go ahead
with it.
Mr.Raghu Rai may end up as Mr.Kevin Carter (he may sell the rights of showing his end to a TV channel too). What would these journalists do if the person involved was a relative? Aren't there enough
'stories' (nowadays there are no news only 'stories' ) in each household? Would any journalist cover the conflict between his family members as a story - to be telecast at least as a filler?
People having common sense always set the priority of humanity before
professionalism in their list.
Soul-Stirring article..Very true that a journalist should record such incident for bringing it up at a larger platform to persuade strong actions but at the same time he should try to help the victim also either individually or with the help of police or other people.
Ethics of photographers, discussed ad nauseam in TV shows and in print media (including this article) have all failed to highlight the excellent example set by Associated Press photographer Huynh Cong Ut who not only did yeoman service by making the world see the curel aspects of war, through his graphic photograph of a Vietnamese girl child running in agony after being attacked in a dastardly manner by Napalm bombs, but also subsequently ensuring that she got the required medical attention, which but for his efforts she wouldn't have. His work was instrumental in causing aversion in the American psyche, thus stopping the Vietnam war. In the instant case, I saw a TV show in which a representative of the TV Channel to which the photographer belonged, claim that he did inform the Police, but they took their own time to arrive at the scene, properly prepared to tackle the ugly situation.
Without the film that this journalist shot, the wicked perpetrators of this heinous crime may not have been caught. Even had they been apprehended, their involvement would have been hard to prove. This journalist did the right thing.
The journalist was not assigned to shoot a porn movie. He definitely has erred in his individual ethics in not trying to rescue the beleagured teenager whose modesty was outraged by barbaric vultures trying to make hay while the sun shines with the strength of belief that nobody was watching them and they could do anything before making a great escape. Would the journalisst been a silent spectator if his kith and kin was involved in such an incident. The journalist deserves to be prosecuted against and if found guilty awarded exemplary punishment so that other members of the fraternity learn a lesson.
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