It‘s widely accepted that a journalist must accept moral responsibility for what they write. Granted, the repercussions of publishing a slating review of a, for example, new brand of mascara are not as great as, say, an interview with a fascist politician, but they are repercussions nonetheless. The beauty journalist works under the assumption that their readers want and need to be exposed to the realities of the consumer market for mascara, she casts her claims of its crumbliness out into the ether to be digested, debated. She asks her readers to accept or refute her claims of its tendency to make you look like two spiders have crawled into your eye sockets and entrusts her readers with the benefit of the doubt that they have the intelligence to make up their own minds about it accordingly.
Notwithstanding the bad analogy, the theme remains the same – the very crux of our free media is the freedom and the right to communicate and discuss the beliefs and ideas of everyone. But a writer (and those who decide to publish their words) must always be accountable for what is circulated under their name, and must be prepared to justify it or face the consequences. Samantha Brick took the 5000 odd comments under her article “Why women hate me for being beautiful” on her “witchy”, “bulldog” chin because she had to. You said it, you bear the backlash – those are the rules.
It is now commonplace to find acerbic comments under every online article in the same way that it is not unusual for journalists to be the subject of intimidating ‘twitch-hunting’. Daily Mail writer, Melanie Phillips, revealed her disappointment at the abuse she had received from her readers, citing comments as despicable as “Go and suck a tail pipe, get cancer, GET RAN OVER BY A TRAIN. I hope your f****** house burns down” as amongst the worst. How much sympathy can be granted her for her naively high expectations of the commentators on the Daily Mail Online is another question, aside from the point that these “trolls” should not be able to get away with it. What difference is there between commenting below an article viewed by thousands, if not millions of people, and publishing your opinion in a newspaper? And likewise, how can someone tweeting to a following of hundreds be less answerable to their actions than the average journo?
The ringing chorus of hallelujahs I heard were not seasonal Christmas refrains but the sweet sounds of exultation when I read of justice being brought to the tweeters that falsely implied that Lord McAlpine was a paedophile. Those who circulated the defamatory claims on Twitter who had over 500 followers will be sued by his lawyers for libel. And rightly so. Because when the BBC and ITV did the same thing they bore the brunt of the law, and it is only fair and consistent that Sally Bercow and all the rest should receive the same treatment.
There are rules and laws that are designed to regulate cases of bad journalism – and these are in place to protect people from falling victim to ungrounded claims. There is no reason that these rules should not be the same when applied to the internet. Every time you tweet; create a blog post; comment on picture of Nadine Dorries in a bikini you are publishing – and if the press are to be regulated then so should you.
By the time this article goes to print the findings of the Leveson Inquiry will have been revealed. The press will receive tougher regulation after appalling breaches of media law and numerous cases of abandonment of decent moral practise. So logically the regulation of internet publishing should follow suit. Surely that’s only fair? The implications of the word ‘press’ have become outdated as the all-encompassing term ‘media’ usurps it. Tweeting is the journalism of our generation. And we are all journalists.
By Ellie Parkes