Situation:
The film, “Shattered Glass” presented us the true story of young reporter, Stephen Glass, that worked at The New Republic. Glass was very popular with readers, coworkers and other news outlets for his extraordinary stories. His world came crashing down around him though when he got caught up in his own web of lies, exposing that he not only fabricated one of his stories, but the majority of them.
The two ethical issues that stood out the most that Glass decided to shatter were his fabrication of his articles and lying not only to the public, but continually to his coworkers causing to break trust. He was so hungry to have the next best story week after week and to keep impressing that he wasn’t even concerned with presenting real, truthful information to the public.
Analysis:
Something popular with some in the journalism world is pushing the truth as far as they can, to the point right before it is no longer the truth. Some go into the other side and do end up fabricating. Jefferson Spurlock stated that liars “lie to protect themselves, look good, gain financially or socially and avoid punishment.” For journalists’ sake, the first time they lie is most likely to gain socially and looking good to coworkers and readers.
For Stephen Glass, gaining socially and looking good was originally his main objective behind the reasoning of why he fabricated stories. He told CBS’s 60 Minutes, Steve Kroft that he wanted every story to be a home run because he loved the excitement he got from his coworkers every time he pitched a story. Then his lying turned to protecting himself because he didn’t want everyone to know all of the stories were actually fabricated and fake.
Because of all of his fabrications and wanting to save himself from looking bad, Stephen continued his streak of ethical issues and lied to coworkers and readers. He created fake notes, email addresses, phone numbers, and websites to make the fabricated pieces seem “legitimate”. Even when he was confronted about the articles, he continued to lie to his coworkers and had them believing him, but then questioning their editor for questioning Glass.
Glass induced his coworkers to mistrust their own boss before they would mistrust him. After that fell through and everyone saw the truth, they all had come together, no longer trusting him, and stood behind the editor after firing Stephen.
Sissela Bok says that “whatever matters to human beings, trust is the atmosphere that thrives.” We are able to see firsthand, the atmosphere that Glass created was chaotic. So much so, that one of his fellow coworkers was ready to quit The New Republic. Glass ended his time at The New Republic with no trust and almost breaking a very strong news outlet.
Conclusion:
Overall, Stephen Glass is a really great example to all journalists on what not to do. He had the opportunity to come clean the first time he was questioned by his first boss. Glass could have owned up to that fabrication so it wouldn’t have cause him to dive deeper into lying more and breaking all the trust he had within his coworkers. Owning up to that fabrication could have had made him look more accountable.
An important take away from Glass’s story is to own up to your own truth, and for him, it was that he fabricated the majority of his stories. I will tell him to take that for what it is and own that, tell the truth about it. Not after a while, but in the time it is happening. The truth will always set you free.
References:
Jefferson, Spurlock. “WHY JOURNALISTS LIE: THE TROUBLESOME TIMES FOR JANET COOKE, STEPHEN GLASS, JAYSON BLAIR, AND BRIAN WILLIAMS.” EBSCOhost, Jan. 2016, web.b.ebscohost.com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=7&sid=d94125df-cbd9-455f-8e5a-2b62f452af1e@pdc-v-sessmgr01.
Kodish, Slavica. “Trust Matters: An Exploration of Low-Trust and High-Trust Organizational Contexts.” EBSCOhost, 1 Jan. 2006, web.b.ebscohost.com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=12&sid=16882fc4-cf54-4e94-8d29-99689cf0eae1@pdc-v-sessmgr03.
