Two Important Ethical Lessons I Learned from COMM 409:
Two ethical concepts that I truly grasped the importance of in this course were the concepts of truth telling and deception. First, truth, is an essential concept in journalism. Journalists have a duty to provide the public with facts. As said in lecture, truth breeds trust. Journalists will gain a following once they build trust with their audience, and that trust will come from the truth. So what does a truthful journalistic account look like? A truthful account is a free from biased account in which the quotes are completely accurate.
On the contrary is the concept of deception. Deception means, “Sending a message intended to make others believe what we ourselves do not believe.” Deception is often apparent through spoken lies, through actions and even through silence. We learned in lecture that there are two groups it is never acceptable for a journalist to lie to, and those two groups are their audience and their colleagues. By knowingly engaging in deception, journalists are diminishing their hard earned trust and risking never earning it back. Deception was evident in the Stephen Glass’ case that we observed and analyzed in class.
One Case Study that Impressed Me the Most and Why?:
In COMM 409, we analyzed dozens of case studies, but the Stephen Glass case stood out to me above the rest. I think it is because of how many ethical dilemmas the case brought up.
In class, we watched the movie “Shattered Glass” which focused on the journalistic career of Stephen Glass. Glass worked for a newspaper called The New Republic, and during his time at The New Republic, Glass fabricated dozens of stories. The ethical dilemmas brought forth in “Shattered Glass” present learning opportunities both for the journalistic industry and future journalism students.
Glass fabricated dozens of stories. Along with embellished details, Glass created quotes to fit a certain piece. Glass additionally implemented imaginary events into his stories and lied to his coworkers when they questioned his stories. He went as far as creating fake websites and fake phone numbers to trick employees into thinking his sources were legit.
All of these wrongdoings fall under the umbrella of deception or fabrication. By no means were Glass’ actions ethical. By engaging in fabrication and deception, Glass violated the basic rules of journalism.
Envision the Course’s Impact on Future Career and Life:
After careful consideration, I have decided to further my educational career by attending law school after graduation. But, just because I have decided on a different profession, it doesn’t mean that these principles will not be applicable to me. In fact, the exact opposite is true. Truth telling is essential when studying the law. In addition, deception and fabrication are certainly not acceptable as a lawyer.
In the same way that journalists must provide truth in order to instill trust in their audience, lawyers must provide truth in order to create a feeling of trust in their clients. Similar to journalists, when lawyers create a trusting environment they will obtain a following.
Deception and fabrication have serious consequences in the court room. Much like journalists, lawyers who are caught in the act of lying or fabricating risk losing their job and facing criminal convictions. In fact, if a lawyer is caught lying or fabricating under oath, they will face criminal charges of perjury.
So, although I do not necessarily want to pursue a journalistic career, many, if not all, of the ethical principles that I learned from the COMM 409 course content will applicable in my future career.
Reflection on this Course as a Whole:
I truly believed this course was a beneficial course to me. As I mentioned earlier, I no longer believe I will work in the communications industry following graduation, but I believe the content in the course is applicable to any career in the professional world. Ethics and truth telling is important no matter the profession.
A few things, in particular, stood out to me about this course. First, I think it was beneficial to complete projects and papers both on our own and with a team. When it comes to school work, I normally prefer working on my own, and I was able to do this throughout the semester by completing blogs and exams. I like working on my own because I like working at my own pace. I like setting my own expectations, and I like meeting my expectations. When I work on my own, I control the quality of my work, and if I don’t meet me expectations, I am the only person to blame. However, this is not the case in a group environment. In a group project, you have to rely on others to create a desired final result. Each member of the group must pull their weight in order to create a successful project. This requires a great deal of trust in team members. This was the case in my COMM 409 group project. I placed a great deal of trust in my group members to aid in the completion of our case study. I was very pleased with the end result of our project. Much like this project, in the work place I am sure I will have to work on teams. I will, similarly have to put faith and trust in my team members to pull their weight. I believe working in a group setting successfully prepared me for the future.
Another component of the course that I enjoyed was the analysis of case studies. I liked this because we got to look at real life situations that have occurred in the journalistic industry. We looked at reality. We were able to learn from other’s mistakes and shortcomings. For example, as I mentioned previously, we analyzed the Stephen Glass case. We were able to experience how fabrication can lead to most extreme consequences of job loss and tarnished reputations.
Last, I believe Dr. Z’s willingness to help his students truly took the course from a good course to a great course. I went to Dr. Z’s office hours quite a few times throughout the semester, and each time I ended up staying for about an hour. First, he answered any questions I had about the project. Then, he offered me extra insight on how to better my project. After, he was always willing to talk about future plans, the communications industry, and even life at Penn State. I truly feel like he cared about my well-being and success at Penn State.
Once, I was unable to make it to office hours, so he set aside time for me to call him over the phone to assure my questions were answered. He also provided extra credit opportunities for students. If students are motivated and willing to put effort into this course, they can absolutely achieve success.