Dave, I respect your decision but I don't share it. I never faced the actual situation in 18 years of daily newspaper experience, but I would have said no. To me the likelihood of small children and persons susceptible to all sorts of mental and physical problems when viewing that accident makes the decision easy to make. I think most adults can and will imagine the collision; it isn't necessary to show it to gain the deterrent factor. Good column.
Thanks for the feedback, Anne. I was normally quite restrained in such tough calls. If I had room in the column, I could give examples. This is one I could think of where I went for the more questionable option.
I agree with Anne, if running it is to deter future such incidents, why not show the mangled bodies too. No, as someone who has PTSD from a previous accident, I have witnessed such coverage, not realizing it was going to go all the way. The sound of vehicles impacting sends me to a very bad place. I had just assumed the video would end before the impact.
I think an equally difficult decision must be in crimes where stations and newspapers publish the offender's photo. On one side, I hate to give them that fame. Others might want to follow his/her example thinking of the fame they would get. On the other hand, people need to know who it is. I don't know what my decision would be.
Andrea, agree that’s a tough call, but specially the suspects in these mass shootings. Don’t want to give them notoriety but folks have a right to know who committed the crime, which often informs WHY they did it.
I recall a tough call made by the Des Moines Register when there was a murder in the small town I lived in. The woman who was murdered had a tough life. She survived an assault by her husband who had shot her in the face. For some years she had a plastic mask on one side of her face. When she was murdered and pulled out of the river someone found the mask and stuck it in her boot. A photographer took a photo of the mask in her boot and the Register had to decide whether to use it. On the one hand it was gruesome, but on the other it told the story of the woman's tragic life and end. They published the photo. Many years later I took a journalism course and the issue was discussed of when to use a photo and the instructor used that example.
Always a tough call. When I was editor of The Laurens Sun, we had to deal with a boating accident that took the life of a local teenage girl. Sheriff's deputies provided a photo of the two boats, asking that I publish in order to discourage drinking and boating. I ultimately did not, agonizing over the additional anguish the photo would bring to the young lady's family. But I also clearly understood law enforcement's justification. Tough call. David Weiss
Dave, I respect your decision but I don't share it. I never faced the actual situation in 18 years of daily newspaper experience, but I would have said no. To me the likelihood of small children and persons susceptible to all sorts of mental and physical problems when viewing that accident makes the decision easy to make. I think most adults can and will imagine the collision; it isn't necessary to show it to gain the deterrent factor. Good column.
Thanks for the feedback, Anne. I was normally quite restrained in such tough calls. If I had room in the column, I could give examples. This is one I could think of where I went for the more questionable option.
I agree with Anne, if running it is to deter future such incidents, why not show the mangled bodies too. No, as someone who has PTSD from a previous accident, I have witnessed such coverage, not realizing it was going to go all the way. The sound of vehicles impacting sends me to a very bad place. I had just assumed the video would end before the impact.
I think an equally difficult decision must be in crimes where stations and newspapers publish the offender's photo. On one side, I hate to give them that fame. Others might want to follow his/her example thinking of the fame they would get. On the other hand, people need to know who it is. I don't know what my decision would be.
Andrea, agree that’s a tough call, but specially the suspects in these mass shootings. Don’t want to give them notoriety but folks have a right to know who committed the crime, which often informs WHY they did it.
I recall a tough call made by the Des Moines Register when there was a murder in the small town I lived in. The woman who was murdered had a tough life. She survived an assault by her husband who had shot her in the face. For some years she had a plastic mask on one side of her face. When she was murdered and pulled out of the river someone found the mask and stuck it in her boot. A photographer took a photo of the mask in her boot and the Register had to decide whether to use it. On the one hand it was gruesome, but on the other it told the story of the woman's tragic life and end. They published the photo. Many years later I took a journalism course and the issue was discussed of when to use a photo and the instructor used that example.
Yikes. That seems pretty gruesome, Karl. I don’t remember that case. I’m sure Register editors carefully weighed the pros and cons.
Always a tough call. When I was editor of The Laurens Sun, we had to deal with a boating accident that took the life of a local teenage girl. Sheriff's deputies provided a photo of the two boats, asking that I publish in order to discourage drinking and boating. I ultimately did not, agonizing over the additional anguish the photo would bring to the young lady's family. But I also clearly understood law enforcement's justification. Tough call. David Weiss
Every situation is different. Rules don’t apply to every story. Because the answer usually is “it depends”.