When someone is guilty of murder will they forever be a murderer? So once a liar always a liar, right? For Stephen Glass, a former journalist who worked for The New Republic, that might or might not be the case.
“If Glass were to fabricate evidence in legal matters as readily and effectively as he falsified material for magazine articles, the harm to the public and the profession would be immeasurable,’ observed State Bar Court Judge Catherine Purcell, dissenting from two other judges who found Glass morally fit to practice law.”(CNN)
After 13 years of hiding and some years of therapy, Stephen Glass is now ready to fight for clients in court as an ethical person, or so he says. In the media during the mid 90’s Stephen Glass was the J.K. Rowling in the 20th century. Publishing over forty articles by 1998, Stephen Glass was fired for partially and fully fabricating articles.
“ ‘The only thing I think you can say in defense of The New Republic was that we were up against somebody, at the time, who was really determined to deceive the magazine. And that is quite unusual.’ ” Says Chuck Lane who was an editor from 1997-1999 at The New Republic.
Before being fired, one of Glass’s final pieces was about a 15-year old hacker who hacked into a company by the name of Jukt Micronics. In this article Stephen wrote how the teenager was being praised by The National Assembly of Hackers for hacking into Jukt Micronics. He also stated in his article that Jukt Micronics offered the hacker tens of thousands of dollars to never do it again. He also claimed that a bill called the Uniform Computer Security Act was passed. All of these claims, including the Center for Interstate Online Investigations, were false. If not for a competitor trying to do a follow up story, Glass might still be a journalist today.
His reasoning behind all of these lies, entertainment. Glass loved the thrill and excitement when he would present his story to the staff and editor. The fact is, everyone believed him every time he made up a new story. Once it comes down to it, news is boring and the reporter loses inspiration to be the best. Maybe once in a while journalists will run into that front-page huge news story that spreads like lice. Glass’s news stories were a comedy script in paragraph form, and nobody questioned him because he was a good writer.
I despise rumors, they are mean, hurtful, the person being talked about takes action and most importantly it is NOT TRUE. Stephen Glass is the person every journalist should aim not to be, along with other unethical journalists.
A Journalist’s job is to tell the truth, the full truth, and nothing but the truth. Nevertheless, news stories are suppose to enhance the public on the truth of what happened, why, and how. When journalists sway from that idea, he/she is already corrupt. When one lies about a news story one could have created a rumor. Take for example this untrue statement: “Jade Johnson watched her car tumble down a hill with her baby in the vehicle”. This effects mainly jade, because I made her seem like a psycho baby killer. The public now batters her nickname “baby killer.” If jade tries to find a job a month after her story dies down, she might not get hired because she is a “baby killer,” misinformed it was a fake story. Ethics as a journalist are very important. People are expecting the truth of “what’s going on” or “what happened after.” It is unnecessary to lie about a story only to make yourself look like a good writer. When in reality you are only creating your own destruction.
Sources
http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/16/justice/stephen-glass