The Society of Professional Journalists national ethics committee debated whether network medical correspondents, some of whom are physicians, should be giving aid while covering the earthquake aftermath in Haiti. I am a member of that committee.

After much discussion and dissension, the committee released a statement cautioning journalists to avoid becoming part of the story. The committee heard backlash from journalists and the public, some of whom perceived the statement as saying physicians should have stood by and watched people die.

Committee members raised several relevant considerations. One is physicians take the Hippocratic oath to do all they can to save lives. That oath is a higher commitment than voluntarily ascribing to news codes of ethics.

Another argument is journalists are humans. Journalists who are not affected and moved to act are probably not very good journalists.

A third is, despite the best attempts, life sometimes puts journalists in the role of participants. One journalist fessed up that he was a part-time sports writer for a community newspaper that covered his high school team and he wrote stories about his team.

Disaster scenes tend to rip out the innards of anyone there, including journalists. To report effectively, journalists must immerse themselves in the misery as they search for the truth. Often, simply writing a story seems inconsequential in light of the belief that putting on a pair of gloves and moving rocks would accomplish more.

I’ve been on both sides. On some occasions I reminded myself that fully telling the story brings the opportunity to mobilize many people to help and that my hands were better used to report the story.

Other times, I got personally involved. In one instance, I stopped covering it as a journalist when I got personally involved. I did, however, write in my column about efforts of other people involved. In another instance where I got personally involved first but later felt compelled to write about it, I included a disclaimer of my involvement and how it came about. In a couple of instances, I gave money anonymously.

One situation was the criminal case of a young woman charged with embezzlement. Her only family was her grandmother. The case went to trial, and I will never forget the day her grandmother testified.

She dressed in her Sunday best with a fine hat and maybe a pair of white gloves. She walked up the aisle of the courtroom with such grace and elegance that one would have thought she was royalty.

During questioning, she was asked whether her granddaughter had, indeed, used the embezzled money to buy fancy underwear. The grandmother confirmed she had seen fancy underwear in her granddaughter’s possession.

She then paused and asked, “Am I allowed to say that word in court?” The word was underwear. The judge answered affirmatively, and the woman continued her testimony.

A jury convicted the granddaughter. Some months later, I saw a notice in the weekly newspaper that the grandmother had died. She had no family to pay the cost of the funeral, so the local bank set up a fund that people could donate to. I remembered that day in court when the grandmother showed such dignity and thought it awful that she passed from this life as a debtor. I took $50 to the bank and asked a teller to deposit it in the funeral fund.

What troubles some members of the ethics committee about the medical care from physician correspondents is the self-promotion afterward. They and anchors announced and discussed it on air as if to imply, “Look, what a good boy am I.”

One critic of the SPJ statement noted the public doesn’t like or trust journalists, so why not show journalists pitching in to help as anyone else would. In other words, journalists could use some good public relations.

If journalists want good PR, they should join a public relations firm. If they need the ego stroke of an international audience bragging on them, I wonder why they are in journalism.

As I once told a young prosecutor who was complaining about his salary, which was twice mine at the time, “Those of us who fight for truth, justice and the American way should not expect much in remuneration.”

Journalism is hard work with little fanfare. But those who do it, love it and are called to it know they serve a higher commitment than public opinion polls.

— Young is a Register-Herald columnist. E-mail: ynerissa@verizon.net

© 2010 by Nerissa Young