Readers' Ombudsman: Balancing the right to know with the right not to be offended

Published on Sunday 8 March 2009 20:47

NEWSPAPERS can often face the difficult balancing act of giving readers information in such detail that they are left in no doubt as to the facts of a story, and at the same time protecting readers from offensive and disturbing material.

The sad fact is there is plenty of material out there that is offensive and disturbing for reasonable people.

This difficult judgment usually comes up with regard to photographs. Decisions have to be made as to whether a picture is too intrusive, too disrespectful for the family of a deceased person, too sexually explicit or too graphic. In the aftermath of atrocities, there are usually many photographs that would be regarded as too graphic to publish.

At the same time, it is a newspaper's job to let people know exactly what is out there, exactly what carnage a bomb can cause, the very real consequences of invasion or attack. Not to show these could leave us open to allegations of sugar-coating or even collusion in suppressing unpopular political decisions.

Readers of quality newspapers expect honesty and integrity from their newspapers. It is at the heart of the contract that lies between reader and newspaper. Before any judgments are made to keep information out of the paper, it has to be thought about long and hard in case it might undermine that essential contract. It is our job to provide information.

But we also know we can offend readers, and we often get letters complaining about material that some have found too explicit. I said this mainly happens concerning photographs, but there other areas in which this crops up.

Obviously, we adhere to the new Press Complaints Commission-approved guidelines on the reporting of suicides.

But the other area of great contention is the reporting of criminal trials involving alleged sex crimes or crimes of violence.

This is particularly true when reporting hearings involving alleged sex acts against children. Obviously, if there are children involved, the capacity to disgust our readers is even greater and even more care must be taken.

We recently had to think very carefully about a court case in which a man was accused of sodomising an 18-month-old boy. Should we go with the graphic term as used in the charge, or should we avoid causing distress to our readers by using one of the euphemisms that newspapers conventionally fall back on? Many other newspapers reported the case using expressions like "carried out a serious sexual offence against" or "sexually assaulted". In our view, these euphemisms did protect readers but failed to convey the full import of the allegations, and for us that failing was more serious than the risk of offence. I think we probably got it right.

I KNEW begging the question would provoke a response. I must say I am still confused about it, but Eric Campbell offers this observation: "On the subject of "begs the question" (Ombudsman, 2 March), my understanding is that it means (perhaps paradoxically) both to evade the issue or assume a thing which requires proof and to suggest a question requires to be addressed.

"My Collins would appear to support this view. I will be interested to read others thoughts about the topic."

I will too.

Now for the last, last word. In the great debate about whether "a number" can be singular, plural or both, I said I would leave the last word to Robert Ritchie. But instead, I'll use this from Steuart Campbell, just to show how unforgiving the cruel world of grammar lovers can be.

"I find it surprising that someone explaining how to deal with the grammatical conundrum of 'number' (Robert Ritchie) should himself write 'And so, from I…' Surely everyone knows that it should be 'And so, from me…'

&#149 You can contact Ian Stewart on 0131 620 8633, at [e-mail] or at 108 Holyrood Road, Edinburgh, EH8 8AS.