Traffic accidents are no laughing
matter. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case for the head of the Shaanxi
Provincial Bureau of Work Safety, Yang Dacai. It all began on August 30, 2012
in Yan’an, China, located in northern Shaanxi, where a horrific car accident
had occurred leaving 36 civilians dead. Following the accident, Chinese
bloggers known as “flesh searchers,” who delve deep into the Internet, in
search of information to expose whomever they are targeting, found an image of
Dacai grinning at the scene of the traffic accident.
The scrutiny of
Dacai’s life was taken a step further when the following day, flesh searchers
stumbled upon several pictures of Dacai wearing a total of 11 pricey watches. Dacai
tried to defend himself by claiming that the watches were purchased using his
own salary. However, members of the Chinese microblogging outlet, Weibo, argued
that it is doubtful that a civil servant’s salary would be enough to afford
such watches (Business Insider Adam
Taylor). The civil servant has been relieved of his duties and is under
investigation and is still currently under investigation by the Communist Party
of China.
“It strikes me as
an example of the power of the Internet,” Steve Hayes, a writer for the Digital Journal, clarified when
commenting on his motivation for covering the Dacai story. When a reporter is
covering a story, where an image is what gives the story news value, it is
incumbent upon them to include the picture on the article page. However, an
ethical dilemma is presented to the writer when they are passionate about
disseminating a story, but “the only photographs [they] could find of the
official either were copyright material or were possibly so,” Hayes explained. Hayes
attempts to justify his decision to still submit his article even without the
images by arguing, “the article does, however, include links to such
photographs.”
When
readers or subscribers see a headline that reads “Chinese official
exposed by bloggers,” they typically presume that a photo would in some
way be incorporated into the article web page. That being said, once they find
the links on the article page, the majority of the readers would click this
link because they are curious to see the pictures. Additionally, the links that
are included in Hayes’ article are links to other articles about the same
topic, so readers would not have to go back to his article, since they have
everything and more on the new page.
Having
said that, Hayes was put in an economic dilemma because without the pictures,
he runs the risk of losing readers to other news websites. News websites anticipate
that after finishing an article, readers will go back to a news websites homepage
and read another one, but this cannot be achieved if the reader is taken to
another website. On the other hand, links to other articles can be beneficial for
the reader because it gives them different perspectives as well as additional
information on the story.
Even
though when asking Hayes if he considers ethics when making these types of
decisions, he responded by saying “I am not particularly concerned with ethics;
morality is a far better guide,” it can still be inferred that Hayes is
somewhat of a preference utilitarian. A preference utilitarian differs from a
classic utilitarian in that they fulfill actions, which are determined by
individual’s interests or preferences. It could be argued that when covering
this story, Hayes considered the interests of readers, who have a curiosity for
these types of local stories that take place overseas and satisfied them by
communicating this story. Preference utilitarianism is similar to the third
stage of moral development in that in both cases the journalist is doing
something to satisfy others.
It
would seem as though Hayes is more concerned about morality when it comes to
making difficult journalistic decisions. With that said, it could also be
inferred that when Hayes made the decision not to post any photos of Dacai on
his article page because they were all copyrighted, the fifth stage of moral
development may have been considered, which is the legalistic view of right and
wrong. Unless given permission by the rights holders, it would be illegal to
include copyrighted images in his article page, making links his last resort.
What
seems to be the issue is not necessarily the links, but the placement of the
links in Hayes’ article. By including links in the beginning and bulk of the
article, readers would almost immediately click them so they could see the
photos. However, if Hayes were to place the links at the bottom of the page
that might encourage readers to at least read through the entire article before
going to website with the images. A reader’s curiosity is as unique as a
reader’s iris. What I mean by that is while some reader’s may read Hayes’
article and click the links at the bottom of the page, some may not. Therefore,
including the link is still necessary because from a journalist’s perspective,
they have to assume that the majority of readers want to see the photos.
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