Images of the war in Iraq have been in newspapers and on television almost nonstop since combat began nearly two weeks ago.
These images have been startling, poignant, fascinating and disturbing.
The debate over which photographs ought to be published in the newspaper is ongoing in many communities. Viewing fleeting images on television is one thing; looking at the faces of captured and killed U.S. troops on the front page first thing in the morning is something else.
These debates aren’t limited to readers. Journalists are having similar discussions. Questions of taste, effectiveness, newsworthiness, fairness and integrity come up daily.
On March 23, News Editor Nancy Laughlin and Executive Editor Carole Leigh Hutton discussed whether the Free Press should publish photographs of the first U.S. soldiers taken prisoner.
Hutton and Laughlin were faced with deciding whether to run the photo of captured Army Spec. Joseph Hudson and four unidentified POWs. The photographs were distributed on Iraqi television and quickly picked up by news organizations worldwide.
For early editions of the Free Press, Hutton decided to publish only Hudson’s photo. She had heard his mother interviewed by ABC’s Peter Jennings, so she knew the family was aware of his capture. The Free Press also published an Associated Press photo of Hudson’s mother with a picture of her son.
For later editions, Hutton decided to use the photos of the other four captured soldiers as well.
A news story that day on the controversy over airing POW footage said the Free Press withheld the photographs of the unidentified prisoners in its early editions to allow time for their families to be notified. The photos were published in later editions after they appeared on several online publications and were widely available for viewing.
It was not an easy decision.
“We withheld the photographs initially because we didn’t want to risk being the way the families learned this devastating information, and our early editions are actually available at night,” Hutton said.
“But we were confident that the military would have plenty of time to contact all the families before the next day,” she said. “And it was clear late Sunday night that the photographs were available on a number of Web sites for anyone who went looking for them.”
No readers called the Free Press to object to the publication of the POW photos.
Discussions about publishing appropriate war images are ongoing in newsrooms worldwide. And at the Free Press, those decisions are weighed and discussed many times each day.
