Journalists must be careful when writing about certain groups to avoid bias and misrepresentation. Guidelines from the National Union of Journalists aim to promote ethical, accurate and unbiased writing about sensitive topics. However, some journalists still publish exaggerated or one-sided stories that could increase hatred toward groups. The language used and connotations of words must also be considered to avoid offense or unfair representation.

1. Task 10
Hayley Roberts

2. Social and Cultural Awareness
We are influenced and persuaded by the articles we read in newspapers and magazines and when we read an article we trust the words of
the journalists and they give the power to influence us. We are told about an event which has happened and we trust what the
journalist is saying about that event as we weren’t there at that time so when we read about it we expect a reliable and unbiased
piece about this event which has happened. But even though they are telling us the story and we trust what is being said, sometimes
they might exaggerate a story or event to try and engage the readers but with it being factual writing they have to keep the facts
100% honest and true and they have to also think about the social, legal and ethical responsibilities. There are guidelines in place and
this is for journalists to read and make sure they meet the guidelines that are set because if they don’t stick to them then it can cause
anger or upset for certain groups of people. When they are writing about a story, some of them can involve certain groups of people
and when writing about these groups they need to think of the emotional side of writing about them and how it could affect the
audience if they read about the groups of people. They need to make sure they are writing truthful about these groups and don’t
make it bias or unhelpful about these groups as this could give the group a bad representation and this then penalises the group and
makes the audience feel a bad way about the group. This could then cause hatred towards a certain group and everyone has the same
opinion about this group. For example, recently in the news there was a woman who was claiming she was too ill to walk and was
claiming benefits for this, was filmed in Australia surfing and was filmed swimming with dolphins. They had claimed altogether
£200,000 and were jailed for 30 months for the crime they committed. Overall, this story is really bad and they were in the wrong for
doing this and there are people out there who are fraudsters when it comes to benefits but from the article, the journalist needs to
make sure that they apply the facts from the article and don’t go into detail about judging the whole ‘group’ of people on benefits as
this then would start to suggest that all people on benefits claim them when they don’t need them and they do it for money because
they don’t want to work. But if you look further into the group of people on benefits, it involves people who are pensioners as they
are getting money and they do it because some are too old to work and earned the right to have a pension. It also involves parents
with children who are still in education as they get child tax credits which is extra money but only because their children are in
education. It doesn’t just involve the people who are fraudsters and throughout the article they have kept it factual and haven’t made
it as if they are referring to the whole group of people on benefits and this gives the audience the freedom to judge how they want to
without the journalist putting bias information into the article. Another example is there was another story quite recently about 15
people who were suspected to be illegal immigrants and they were hiding in the back of a lorry. A German national had been arrested
on suspicion of facilitating the unlawful entry of people into the UK as at this point it was unsure if they were supposed to be there or
not but they were wanting to go to a place in the South West and the lorry company didn’t explain where the lorry was heading to
and had set off from. They again in this story needed to make sure that they don’t penalise the group of immigrants as there can be
legal immigrants who are categorised into the category of immigrants so they need to make sure that the journalists stick to the
guidelines set. This then wouldn’t give the whole group a hatred and a bad name and even though in these stories they have suck to
the guidelines, some can get really stuck in and create horrendous headlines which can cause hatred towards a group straight away.

3. This image is from a newspaper
front page. It shows a bad
representation of foreign people
immigrating to the UK. They are
stating that every immigrant takes
the new jobs in Britain and they
have highlighted the word ‘all’ in
red which is a really negative colour
and it also stands out on the page
so the audience see that word and
believe that every new job in Britain
is taken by an immigrant. This gives
off a sense of hatred for any
immigrant coming to the UK (illegal
or legal) because it is stating that all
the jobs and houses are taken by
them. This is a really bias headline
and it shouldn’t cause this feeling of
hatred and should be more
statistical rather than being
exaggerated.

4. NUJ Guidelines
To try and stop journalists from representing groups in a bad way in the media, The National Union of Journalists have set up a set of guidelines that
explains a range of ethical guidance and this then leans them towards being more cautious when writing about certain groups and keeps them
from being unbiased. The list of NUJ isn’t a legal union (it was set by a group of people that decided to show journalists their way of writing and
how things should be written) and the guidelines don’t have to be stuck to as the examples show in the last slide and some journalists can still be
bias with their stories but the NUJ try to persuade all journalists to write in the style they are trying to present. The list of groups that the
guidelines are set up for are; terrorism, race, HIV, asylum and immigration, age, disability and suicide. This list is all very sensitive subjects and
groups and so the journalists need to make sure they write sensitively about the groups and that’s why the NUJ group has been put in place
because this group believe that they should be written about with care. If a journalist is unsure about how to write with a sensitive topic then they
can ring up the NUJ’s ethic hotline so then they will get some advice on how to write about a certain group and not what to say about them. The
NUJ also have a code of conduct which again isn’t legal and doesn’t have to be stuck to but the code has 12 rules that the members of the union
should stick to and they are expected to abide by the rules. If they don’t then they will be thrown out of the union or if it becomes a regular
occurrence then they will be thrown out of the union. The 12 rules are;
• At all times upholds and defends the principle of media freedom, the right of freedom of expression and the right of the public to be informed.
• Strives to ensure that information disseminated is honestly conveyed, accurate and fair.
• Does her/his utmost to correct harmful inaccuracies.
• Differentiates between fact and opinion.
• Obtains material by honest, straightforward and open means, with the exception of investigations that are both overwhelmingly in the public
interest and which involve evidence that cannot be obtained by straightforward means.
• Does nothing to intrude into anybody’s private life, grief or distress unless justified by overriding consideration of the public interest.
• Protects the identity of sources who supply information in confidence and material gathered in the course of her/his work.
• Resists threats or any other inducements to influence, distort or suppress information and takes no unfair personal advantage of information
gained in the course of her/his duties before the information is public knowledge.
• Produces no material likely to lead to hatred or discrimination on the grounds of a person’s age, gender, race, colour, creed, legal status, disability,
marital status, or sexual orientation.
• Does not by way of statement, voice or appearance endorse by advertisement any commercial product or service save for the promotion of
her/his own work or of the medium by which she/he is employed.
• A journalist shall normally seek the consent of an appropriate adult when interviewing or photographing a child for a story about her/his welfare.
• Avoids plagiarism.
These should all be stuck to in the union and this helps them talk about groups and ethnic situations really well. The NUJ union also has a ‘conscience
clause’ so if one of the journalists is given a topic and it’s about disabled people and benefits and they are told to either be bias about the article and to
make sure it’s bad and would cause hatred, the journalist can be given support by their union if they refuse to work in the way they have been told to
and this then shows they aren’t going to disobey the rules of the NUJ. The example in the last slide shows where the journalist hasn’t seen the NUJ’s
rules and probably isn’t part of their union but is speaking quite bias and is causing hatred towards a certain group and if they were part of the union
then this would have been stopped. It disobeys the rule number 2 as it’s not an honest, accurate or fair headline as it isn’t statistical and is exaggerated
to make it sound as if there are no new jobs left to the British and are taken by immigrants when realistically it isn’t so this causes it to be inaccurate.

5. Connotations
When the journalist is writing up an article, as well as looking at the guidelines and rules of the NUJ to make sure what they are writing is
unbiased and fair about groups, they also need to think about the language and the words that they use. When we see a word, it
leads to different connotations and we think of words and meanings that associate with that word so then it can lead to different
meanings depending on how people see it. A connotation is created on how we see words and it has several meanings behind the
word compared to it’s actual meaning so that’s why journalists have to be careful when writing about certain groups and the tone of
language they use and the actual words they use to describe the group because it can lead to different meanings and depending on
what the word is, it can come across really offensive. For example, the word ‘disabled’ can come across as someone who isn’t
physically/mentally well and this is the common word that is used to describe someone who isn’t well, but it can have many
connotations with the word and so this is what people can refer to. Some examples of the connotations are ‘cripple’, ‘differently
abled’, ‘deformed’ and ‘dumb’. These words are really strong and powerful when someone is disabled and these can come across
really offensive and can be hurtful towards this group of people. So the journalists need to make sure that they are writing about this
group as they can get a lot of complaints from the audience as they are causing quite a negative appearance for the group itself.
Another example is the image with the headline about benefit cheats. You have to be careful again when writing the word benefits as
this also comes with a range of bad connotations. For example, in the headline, below they use the word ‘fraudsters’ which relates to
the connotation of benefits and the article is persuading people to think these bad connotations built up from the word benefits.
Other connotations that are related to the word benefits are ‘hand-outs’, ‘scroungers’, ‘cheats’ and ‘sick’. When writing about people
on benefits (when they aren’t using them for bad) the journalists need to make sure that they aren’t trying to use words like this as it
then it persuades the audience to think in a bad way about that group and all the connotations will be related in a bad way whenever
they hear the word ‘benefits’. The NUJ have set up a guideline so that journalists know how to write about a certain group and what
words they need to avoid when they do as this then stops the journalist from being bias and influencing
people about the group to the journalists opinion. Some of the words that the NUJ have said is right to use
is when describing a person who is a wheelchair user this is the right context and word to use to describe
them but you can’t use the words ‘wheelchair bound’, ‘in a wheelchair’ and ‘confined to a wheelchair’ as
all these words give a bad impression and can be offensive towards people who are in a wheelchair as it is
makes them sound as if they can’t do anything for themselves and rely on other people to help them so
using the right language and words to describe them won’t come across as offensive to them when they
read it. Even though the guidelines have been set up for the journalist, they don’t always stick to it because
it is not legal and doesn’t have to be stuck to unless the journalist is in the union but it would be better if it
could have been made legal as it would make the articles a lot fairer towards certain groups of people.

6. Alternative Reading
Whenever you are writing something, whether it be a newspaper article or a fanzine page on a website, you always have an audience in
mind and you write to aim it at that particular audience. Even though journalists are writing to a particular audience, they still need to
remember that other people may read the article or come across it and they might not fit into the audience they are writing to. When
other people start reading their work, the journalists need to think and realise that other people may read what they have written
differently and it could be interpreted differently because different people can read words different things (connotations). Depending
on what has happened to people in past experience they would have different interpretations on articles because for example, if they
have been in jail or committed a minor crime, they may read an article which is about crime rate and they are exaggerating the facts
and have linked all people who have committed serious crimes to people who have committed minor crimes, they may find this
offensive and will feel as if they are all being penalised for committing a crime. Where as, if someone who hasn’t committed any
crimes reads the article they will believe that they are all as bad as each other and that no one changes once committing a crime if
the journalist shapes it that way with the language they use so this is why they have to be bias. So people who have experienced
certain experiences can relate to the stories and articles and may find them offensive by the term of language they use and some
phrases if they aren’t being bias and if the journalist starts to be unfair. It can also be turned around so if someone who is a victim of a
crime reads an article, they can relate to it if someone is in the same situation because of a crime then it can be really emotive to that
person reading it in the same situation compared to an average reader who is reading it to find out a situation or an event which has
happened but can still feel the emotion towards the victim. If a journalist starts writing about immigration then they need to make
sure they are bias and fair and talk about both sides of the story rather than letting the journalist put forward their ideas and views on
immigration. If they don’t do so then this can cause offensive towards immigrants and anti-immigration groups and can also cause
hatred towards that group by the public as they will be reading bad views on immigration which then links in with the connotations of
the words used. When Stuart Hall was working on the Reception Theory, he was making sure that he was considering that different
groups of people will read work differently depending on their experience. When
reading the start of this article, you can see that it’s about immigration and it’s a
really serious story that is quite emotive because they have stole a dead mother’s
identity to get into the country. The bullet points go into detail about what is in the
story and sums it up but this article is being bias as there isn’t really bad language
used to describe immigrants and they are only explaining the points of the story
and so people can read it how they want to but people will feel that they are trying
to show a bad example on immigrants because they are using a really emotive and
serious story but some will feel that this is what all immigrants are like in Britain.