The Radio station DJ's who pulled the stunt on the Royal Family are taking a lot of heat now that a nurse has killed herself. She was duped by the DJs into believing the Queen wanted to talk to the pregnant Kate. But every single news director and news editor who made a big deal out of it are just as guilty of driving this poor nurse over the edge. They are all criticizing the radio jocks when they should be pointing the finger at themselves.
1 comment:
Exactly. Thank you. Excellent point.
I'll take it even further. Whenever you call somebody for any reason for any story you are exploiting them for personal gain, gain that has financial, and career, or status, dimensions.
But what about the public good that comes out of it, some may ask?
What about it? First of all, that's not the prime motivator for any reporter I've ever known and secondly, the reporter doesn't have an interest in that?
Yes, it's necessary, the media, for the functioning of democracy, but that comes about in spite of everything. It's that there's really no other way to have a free press.
Incidentally, the most successful reporters I knew were the ones who kept thoughts like this furthest from their minds. I likened them to successful car salesmen. They were very good at disarming the people they wanted to exploit. They just wanted information instead of money.
They were nasty people who would not hesitate to climb over your back in furtherance of their careers. I put up with that kind of thing for ten years and it kind of sickens me to think back on it.
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