Iniciativa Mexico reporting guidelines

Last week, most major Mexican media organizations signed an agreement setting guidelines for reporting on the organized crime conflict in the country.

There are 10 points to the agreement:
1) Take a stance against violence
2) Do not become an involuntary spokesman for organized crime
3) Provide context for information
4) Specifically attribute responsibility for crimes
5) Do not prejudge the accused
6) Protect the rights of victims and minors
7) Promote crime prevention and encourage citizens to denounce crime
8) Protect journalists
9) Solidarity with threats or attacks against journalists
10) Do not put operations against criminals at risk

As someone who thinks a lot about media freedom issues (I'll be giving a talk on the subject in early May for World Press Freedom Day), there is a lot to think about with this agreement. Many of the points have good objectives and intentions, but any agreement to self-censor, pre-censor or otherwise restrict coverage makes me nervous.

Copied below are some initial thoughts on the potential good and bad points about this agreement.


Good:

• The same way media should not allow themselves to be manipulated or censored by the government, they should not allow criminals to manipulate and censor them. This agreement works towards those ideals.
• Media outlets should work to resist becoming propaganda outlets for criminal groups. This is important as these criminal groups are working hard to manipulate public opinion in Mexico. Mexico needs to push back against the information warfare conducted by criminal groups.
• Media freedom includes the right of not-publishing information when outlets choose to do so. No media outlet should feel forced to publish certain information.
• Journalists should be placing violence into context and responsible media outlets should not portray today's violent criminals and drug traffickers as a romantic ideal of outlaws, as some narco-propaganda does. They should also not over-report on violence. There are still plenty of areas of Mexico that are relatively safe.
• The agreement calls for media outlets to question the effectiveness of the government's security policies, report on government abuses and to denounce violence and threats against journalists. The agreement also works to set standards to protect victims as well as accused individuals who have not been convicted, which is a standard they should follow.
• By agreeing to these standards, it binds the media outlets in an act of self-restraint, preventing a race to the bottom for the organizations in which they compete to have the bloodiest pictures ("If it bleeds, it leads") from the most atrocious crimes to sell newspapers. It also helps create a cooperative action in which media "scoops" that play into the hands of criminals may be avoided.
• There will still be outlets for this news for people who choose to find it. There are plenty of blogs online, some of which I read, that carry an enormous variety of information. There are also newspapers including Reforma, Proceso and La Jornada that did not sign the agreement.

Bad:

• Self-censorship in the face of violence could potentially lead to more violence and threats against journalists. This agreement may be seen as a sign of weakness rather than strength by some groups.
• The agreement is idealized. Covering crime in its proper context is a great ideal goal, but when a criminal group threatens to kill a hostage or bomb a media outlet that doesn't publish certain information, reality makes this agreement much harder to fulfill.
• Avoiding criminal propaganda should not mean becoming part of government propaganda. Though I agree the criminal groups should not be portrayed as heroes by responsible media, for they are certainly the bad guys, media should also be careful to avoid the opposite assumption that the government, police and military are automatically the "good guys." While many of them are good and noble, there are certainly enough corrupt and bad ones out there that should be held under scrutiny by the media. 
• This voluntary agreement among media outlets should not be used as the justification for censorship laws by the government. The fact I think that responsible media should avoid bloody propaganda pictures and treating the criminals as heroes does NOT mean that the government should criminalize that sort of speech or publishing. Blogs that publish narco-pictures or bands that play the songs that praise the criminals, if they are involved in no other crime, have a right to exist and should not be censored.
• Similarly, while media outlets should avoid tipping off criminal groups about pending government operations, and the government may even have a right to regulate that issue to a certain limited extent, that sort of standard can create a slippery slope into avoiding all sorts of reporting on government actions that should be covered. This agreement should not become a way for the government to hide its dirty laundry.
• This can't be an agreement that causes media outlets to look away from the bloodshed. Violence needs to be reported and the citizens have a right to know the human cost of the conflict. There's a fine line between reporting violence accurately and reporting sensational or propagandistic portrayals of violence. Unfortunately, this agreement could shift the focus to "fluff." Media outlets choosing not to cover certain aspects of crime in Mexico may instead choose to cover additional celebrity gossip and human interest stories over doing the hard work of covering crime in context.
• This agreement has a monopolistic concern. Media diversity is a good thing and having so many media organizations agreeing to cover something in a certain way eliminates diversity and sets a bad precedent for other issues.

Coverage:
BBC, CPJ, WashPost, NarcoNews, LA Times

Source: http://www.bloggingsbyboz.com/2011/03/iniciativa-mexico-reporting-guidelines.html

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