Journalistic Ethics 101: To Publish or not to publish, that is the question

Today, the story of reporter David Rohde broke along with the news that the Times and other major news organizations were complicit in a coverup not to report on the kidnapping.

Rohde was working on book concerning the history of US involvement in Afghanistan when he was captured by the Taliban in November. Several other news organizations including the Washington Post have admitted to suppressing the story at the request of the Times to safeguard the safety of the reporter.

As Kristof explains in his blog,

There will be some second-guessing about the paper’s willingness to suppress the story. But i’m convinced that it was the right decision. We believe deeply that news should be reported, but not at the expense of somebody’s life. In rare situations, when the situations warrants, we should withhold crucial information. Our paramount goal shouldn’t be to publish, but to serve the public interest — and in this case I think that was served by keeping quiet.

This is the second time in recent memory that the Times has come forward with information that the suppressed a story. The first, of course, was the less-defensible NSA warantless surveillance controversy in which the paper withheld the story for more than a year during the 2004 election campaign.

In this situation, the paper seems to have acted a lot more responsibly. The life of a reporter was on the line, rather than an issue of public policy. More interesting was the willingness of other news organizations like the Post not to report on the situation. Further, at this stage along in the Internet revolution it's also impressive that no one from within the Times organization leaked the news of the abduction to bloggers or other news outlets less willing to fall in line with the Times. It's amazing that a few well-placed phone calls to high-placed editors and internal memos actually managed to shut down a major story about the kidnapping of an American reporter. The case of CS Monitor stringer Jill Carroll made international news during her captivity in Iraq. There's obviously a market for such news, as well as precedent on reporting it. So bravo to Mr. Rohde for escaping his captivity. The rest of us will debate the ethics of the Times' actions to death, of course, but the good news is that Rohde and an Afghani reporter are both safe.