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After the hunt for rogue countries we have now

Here is more about the Australian journalist who
returned to his country and apparently could not
stomach the latent racism. He is "disovered" by a
racist blogger with a sheriff mentality who complains
the journalist may have used a fictitious name and
Here is more about the Australian journalist who
returned to his country and apparently could not
stomach the latent racism. He is "disovered" by a
racist blogger with a sheriff mentality who complains
the journalist may have used a fictitious name and
profession for his quote. The journalist admits it,
but argues he wanted to protect his source. He then
resigns though his paper announces he was fired.

After the hunt for rogue countries we have now
embarked on the hunt for rogue journalists. This is
how the neon-conservatives in strategic positions
purge dissent. Voices who do not conform to their
codes are purged. Ironically, and not without sinister
motives, this occurs at a time when international
ethics are constantly broken with impunity - just
look at Guatanamo and the Iraq war.
From ULI SCHMETZER: As a veteran journalist with four decades in the profession, 38 of them as foreign correspondent, I am shocked by the callous way that a few executives at the Chicago Tribune handled my case after an association with the newspaper spanning 25 years. Until 1986 I was their stringer, from 1986 I was bureau chief in Rome, Beijing, Manila, New Delhi and Tokyo. I retired in 2002 but continued to work on an exclusive contract basis, renewable annually.

I did not fabricate the quote. I was called about the issue at three in the morning in Jakarta, where I was on assignment. I requested time to prove the quote was not fabricated although I admitted I had changed the name and profession of the person quoted.

Instead the Tribune ombudsman, Don Wycliff, rushed into print a few hours later without allowing me the courtesy of first looking at the text of the correction/apology. The first news I had was when AP -- in a truly professional manner -- contacted me for a comment and sent me a copy of the statement.

I was not fired, as the Tribune is trying to suggest. I resigned. Under the contract Mr. Wycliff signed with
me, he was supposed to give me 30 days notice in case of termination (a clause applicable to both sides).

In fact, I had already told the Tribune by email that I considered the contract terminated. I did so because certain executives at the paper felt I had broken the Tribune's code of ethics/trust following the complaint of one Australian reader who questioned the name and profession attached to a quote -- though not the content of the quote.

The smug announcement by Mr. Wycliff in his column headed: "How a journalist's career came undone" must have given anyone the impression the paper, or at least he, believes all my work is now suspect. Strangely, and perhaps wrongly, I still believe in a society where you are innocent until proven guilty.


In that 3 a.m. phone call, Mr. Wycliff asked me to co-operate if the Tribune investigated other stories. I agreed, unaware I was already convicted. I cannot cooperate with an inquiry whose conclusion appears to have been already determined and that has already condemned before it even started. Since Mr. Wycliff strung me up on a string he now wants my help to weave a proper rope to hang me.

By my own rough estimate Mr. Wycliff and his team (and he has promised to employ as many as 60 people if necessary) will have to peruse some 3,000 stories that I have written for the Tribune over the years. I wish him luck. My conscience is clear. If there were errors during those years they were not errors governed by malice or deceit but normal human errors.

I've had an excellent career and relationship with the Tribune and had unwavering support in often difficult and dangerous situations while I worked as their staff correspondent since 1986. I wish we could have parted on more amiable terms. I love the paper but remain devastated by the way the case was handled. It was so unlike the Tribune I know -- and believed in.

I can only guess someone decided to take my scalp to show the paper was on the bandwagon of the relentless pursuit of rogue journalists. Only I can assure them now, before they go to the expense, they have picked the wrong victim.

What is really in contention here is not my case or the Tribune's decision but the dilemma of ethics in journalism today. This is where the Tribune and I have come into conflict.

Just about every day journalists have to make a decision whether the ethics imposed on them by their papers are in conflict with public interest or their own conscience.

As the European philosopher Slavoj Zizek states in his book "The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre of Political Ontology" it is impossible today to stay impartial and pretend neutrality or hide behind a code of ethics. By remaining neutral you are in fact supporting the status quo. Breaking ethics when it is merited is the right of every individual.

The professional code of ethics is not legally binding. Yes, the company manager who denounces his company for making dirty deals is breaking his company's secrecy act but he prefers to act in the public interest and in tune with his own conscience. Is he wrong?

Take the case of the person who gives you that elusive "perfect quote."

You have assured the guy you are not going to quote him. But what he says absolutely reflects reality and is in the interests of your reading public. What do you do? Do you forget the quote? Do you tag it onto an anonymous source (an option that means it wonít see print these days)? Or do you break your code of ethics and change the name?

During my eight years in China, which included the 1989 massacre at Tiananmen Square, I lived with such dilemmas all the time. If I quoted someone critical of the government or its methods, he or she was certain to lose their job, their apartment and their livelihood -- at the very least. Some Chinese who
dared to talk to foreign reporters have ended up in a labour camp.

So what do you do, if you believe, as I do, that people are more important than institutions or their ethics? As a fellow human being you have a responsibility to the person who has opened his thoughts and his heart. This is where rigid codes of ethics break down.

I felt in my case I acted in the interest of the readers to know there is a segment of the Australian public with this kind of opinion about natives, a fact that nearly all Australians, like myself, are aware of, though few have the courage to say so in public. I cited the quote but refused to use the author's name as this could have ruined his public career.

These are the decisions which journalists wrestle with day after day, in war zones, dictatorships and just plain difficult situations out there in the real world.

It's a very different world from the one inhabited by Mr. Wycliff who pontificates on the rights and wrongs from his ivory tower on the shores of Lake Michigan.
 
 

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