Unless you live in a cave, you can’t have failed to miss the outrage surrounding Jan Moir’s pernicious Daily Mail ‘article’ about the death of Stephen Gately*. I’m not going to post a rebuttal this late in the day – that’s already been done to great effect elsewhere – but I do want to raise a point that occurred to me during the last few days.

For a long time now, some elements of the mainstream media (msm) have been quite dismissive of bloggers, not all, some journalists have embraced blogging, but there are still many who see it as some kind of poor relation at best. One of the biggest criticisms has been that bloggers are not regulated, and therefore lack the ethics of msm journos. Can they still realistically claim that when one of their own published a piece that was so full of vitriol and insinuation even other journalists attacked it**? And of course, it’s not just Jan Moir and the Daily Mail, many newspapers are really not worthy of the name because what they publish isn’t news, or even factual.

Earlier this week the Guardian published the results of it’s attempts to dupe tabloid editors into publishing completely fictitious stories about various well-known people. Have a look, it makes for interesting reading. There is a market for rumour, gossip and innuendo and these publications have absolutely no qualms about supplying it. Yet, the people who write this tripe would still call themselves journalists, and would still insist they operate according to some kind of ethical code. Ironically, journalists do have a code, they are expected to “inform, educate and enlighten”. How does puerile drivel about the sex lives of celebrities do that precisely? Am I missing something? Is it really so important that we know some celeb cries ‘I love stew and dumplings’ in the throes of passion?!

Obviously, I’m not suggesting the blogosphere is packed full of positive, mind-improving, factually correct missives. It isn’t. There is a reason bloggers have a reputation for snark and it’s often appropriate. It’s also true that many bloggers make no attempt to check sources, or do any background research. The difference is, bloggers don’t claim to hold any kind of moral highground. We know we are a loose collection of individuals with widely differing opinions and ethics. Somehow, we do find common ground, and we also tend to challenge anyone who is overtly offensive, not just occasionally, but often.

Over the weekend, I listened to a radio phone-in about the Moir drivel, and heard Matthew Parris (possibly playing devil’s advocate) say that although he found the article offensive***, he supported Moir’s right to publish it because journalists have to cover stories while they are still current. That is a fair point, or would be if this had been a news story, which it wasn’t. The article in question is full of conjecture and hypothesis; it dismisses medical fact and suggests Stephen’s family and the Spanish legal system are involved in some kind of cover-up. That is not news, it’s just sensationalism. Reporting his death was news; insulting a dead man before his family had chance to bury him is not. However, it does highlight the diabolical state of journalism both in the UK and elsewhere.

The idea that an opinion piece must be written just because a news story is ‘hot’ is very wrong. If Stephen Gately had been a politician who preached morality and family values, then yes, the circumstances of his death may have been relevant. But he wasn’t. He was a harmless individual who happened to make a living doing something that brought him to the attention of the public. Should that really mean he, or anyone else, is fair game for any journalist who can’t think of something informative, educational or enlightening to write? I really don’t think so.

There was a time when journalism was an honourable profession; journalists did believe in such silly, old fashioned ideas as common decency, and the wider implications of a story were taken into consideration before publication. The phrase ‘in the public interest’ is often used, but that works both ways. Sometimes, it’s better not to publish something because it has no real value, doesn’t alert the public to anything they should know about, and risks causing pain and offence to innocent people. All that has been forgotten in a desperate attempt to sell newspapers in an ever dwindling market.

And that brings me back to my first point: can journalists really say they are more ethical than bloggers when so many are willing to resort to downright unethical tactics to make money? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

* If you haven’t read the article, Google it, I’m not going to provide a link.

** That is quite unusual, journalists usually keep their criticisms private.

*** Before anyone accuses him of being some vicious right-wing media type, Mr Parris is gay, so I’m guessing would have been quite hurt by some of the ‘suggestions’ about his sexuality.

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