WEEK 8

Donna Meiklejohn was the guest speaker this week and did an amazing job addressing the broad topic of ethics in the media.  Meiklejohn condensed a lot of points into her hour long presentation, and began by showing some examples of advertisements that treaded the line of what was considered acceptable and unacceptable in public broadcasting.  While I found none of the examples downright offensive (in fact some were quite clever), I found the stereotyping and sexist nature of the Jim Beam ad particularly cringe inducing.  After this amusing beginning Meiklejohn got down to business. Detailing an early experience in her journalistic career where she was pressured by her editor into doing a death knock on a bereaved mother, Meiklejohn found the whole situation pushed the boundaries of her personal moral compass: Was it ethical for Meiklejohn to pressure a woman who had tragically lost her three young children into doing an interview just so she could save her own job?  

Meiklejohn also outlined terms such as ‘deontology’ (following the rules), ‘consequentialism’ (the end justifying the means) and ‘virtue ethics’ (your actions as a journalist aligning with your own personal morals) in relation to journalism, which were all interesting concepts. Other interesting topics touched upon were the Fitzgerald inquiry of the 1980s and the Finklestein Inquiry of the present day, as well as an in depth analysis of various media codes and the issue of ‘the public interest’. This was a fascinating and informative presentation and I found Donna Meiklejohn a very  entertaining lecturer.