Last Monday, at the closing lunch of the annual Group of Eight summit meeting in St. Petersburg, Russia, President Bush leaned toward the ear of British Prime Minister Tony Blair – and an open microphone that Bush didn’t know was switched on – and said that the United Nations needs to “get Syria to stop Hezbollah to stop doing this s-, and it’s over.”
News editors around the country immediately asked themselves two questions:
1. Was that news?
2. If it was, how should we quote him?
The answer to the first question is certainly yes. While most people would not be startled to learn that Bush is capable of expressing himself so pungently, it’s not often that such an unguarded presidential comment is heard. Even Bush reportedly rolled his eyes and laughed when he learned that his remarks weren’t private.
The answer to the second question depended on the news outlet.
Most news organizations have strict rules regarding profanity. Typically, they paraphrase such comments, and on the rare occasions they decide to include profanity, they use a dash or ellipses.
For example, The Plain Dealer Stylebook, which governs issues of grammar and word usage, instructs reporters and editors “to make every attempt to avoid the use of profanity, obscenities and vulgarities.” But the book also notes that “it is unusual for someone in a high station to use offending language where he can be quoted by newspaper reporters,” and says that quoting him can be justified when such a person – a president, say – uses profanity in a public way.
We ran the quote in Tuesday’s paper, with the first letter of the offending word followed by a dash. So did most other newspapers, and most television news stations bleeped it out. Notable exceptions were the New York Times and Los Angeles Times, which ran the full word, and CNN, which aired the comment unbleeped.
You don’t have to look hard to find unfiltered obscenities in print. In this case using the full word was never considered at The Plain Dealer, although I’m sure you didn’t have trouble figuring out what it was.
“When we do publish them, we usually use the first letter of the offending word followed by dashes,” said Assistant Managing Editor Daryl Kannberg. “If the swearing is important enough that it’s worth mentioning in a story, you really need to give folks a sense of what was said, and how bad it really was.”
The dominant photo on Monday’s front page showed a civilian woman, bloodied and wailing, being helped from a damaged building in the Lebanese city of Tyre after the building had been hit by an Israeli airstrike. The photo generated a significant number of reader comments and complaints, which fell into three categories:
1. It was too graphic. Many people who read their paper over breakfast, or have it in a house with young children, felt that putting it in color on Page One was offensive and disquieting.
2. Why show a Lebanese victim instead of an Israeli victim? Some Jewish readers felt that the photo selection portrayed the Lebanese woman in a sympathetic light and displayed a bias against Israel.
3. You guys just do that to sell newspapers.
The first question is one that editors face every time they choose to publish an unsettling photo. Is it a critical part of the news report, or would its use simply be gratuitous?
Assistant News Editor Bill Lammers, who designed the front page that day, said the original plan was to use a photo of the tall ships at the Harborfest (that eventually ran on Page A6) on Page One, but then photo editor Lynn Ischay walked up with the image from Lebanon.
“After I looked at the photos from the Mideast, I couldn’t in good conscience say to the readers that the most important thing going on in the world was that it was hot in Cleveland, and people were having a good time,” Lammers said. “What makes the photo powerful to me is her facial expression and the sense of urgency I got from the man who was helping her to safety.”
Lammers said that after the Page One photo Sunday of the fiery Beirut skyline, he thought it was important to offer a from-the-ground perspective on the region.
The second question was not an unexpected reaction. Some of the most moving photos of any conflict show the suffering of the noncombatants. No matter which side we show, readers with loyalties to the other side are convinced that we are trying to turn public sentiment against them.
Debbie Van Tassel, who oversees the Monday paper and made the final decision to run the photo, said political concerns were not on her mind.
“I didn’t even ask if the woman was Israeli or Lebanese,” she said. “To me it was irrelevant. She was an innocent victim of the war and it was a powerful photo.”
As for the third argument, we have dealt with that before.
Yes, The Plain Dealer is in business to sell newspapers. But were more newspapers sold because of that photo? I doubt it. Maybe fewer were sold. People like pictures of the tall ships and often don’t like to be reminded of bad things in the world.
I didn’t like seeing the photo. However, it was a reminder of the human cost of a conflict with innocents on both sides, and putting it on Page One was the right call.
