When asked by people what I am training to become, I often have to grit my teeth and bear the inevitable mocking of my profession. Telling people that I wish to be a journalist in the not too distant future always sparks the same reaction. I find my very own morals and ethics being questioned.
In the last decade things have changed in the world of journalism – the press complaints commission now strictly moderates ethics in the industry and the sanctions imposed on anyone stepping out of line can be crippling.
Such issues have not entirely disappeared, though. Stories emerging this week about further phone hacking by the News of the World have plunged the reputation of journalists right back down to the depths they thought they had long since managed to rise from.
No one can doubt the heinous nature of The News of the World’s latest actions. What they have done goes way beyond the line of day-to-day ethics, and right into the heart of serious crime.
Whether or not the life of school-girl, Milly Dowler could have been saved, had the News of the World not deleted messages from her inbox, does seem questionable at the very least. But what is not questionable, is how wrong and utterly immoral it was for someone to do such a thing.
In the latest development to the story, it has now been announced that this coming Sunday’s edition of the tabloid newspaper will be it’s last. For some it is the end of an era, but for most it is good riddance.
For, it seems, every blotch on the good reputation of journalism in the last five years seems to have been associated with them.
Rebekah Brooks, Chief Executive of News International has claimed that the Guardian newspaper that exposed the latest phone hacking scandal, were ‘out to get us, and got us.’
It seems remarkable that she could ever have hoped that hacking the phone of a murdered school-girl was going to remain secret. Furthermore, how on earth could she have ever expected further developments, such as the hacking of 7/7 victims’ families, to go un-noticed?
The world of journalism has now been left to pick itself up from one of the biggest blows it has taken in years. Who can say if it will ever fully recover? A long road lies ahead, and many challenges await. However, with improved levels of training, and stricter regulation, maybe some public faith can be restored.
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