Tag: new york times

The Poor Suffer Media Neglect

On By southwerkIn Economic Justice
Media Neglect makes it less likely the poor will live like other Americans. They are cast from the garden.

Media neglect results in the issue of poverty in America is never treated as an important issue even though 15% of all Americans suffer from it.

Take at look at this quote from the a study from FAIR, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting

Discussions of poverty in campaign coverage were so rare that PBS NewsHour had the highest percentage of its campaign stories addressing poverty—with a single story, 0.8 percent of its total. ABC World News, NBC Nightly News, NPR’s All Things Considered, and Newsweek ran no campaign stories substantively discussing poverty.

The New York Times included substantive information about poverty in just 0.2 percent of its campaign stories and opinion pieces—placing it third out of the eight outlets, behind PBS and CBS.

By contrast with other issues that have received wider attention in recent campaign coverage, “poverty” was mentioned at all, with or (most often) without substantive discussion, in just 3 percent of campaign stories (309 stories) in the eight outlets. This compares to “deficit” and “debt,” which were mentioned about six times as often, in 18 percent (1,848) of election stories.

Even throwing a wider net, to include stories that mentioned “poverty,” “low income,” “homeless,” “welfare” or “food stamps,” turned up just 945 pieces, 10 percent of total election stories—still well below the rate at which “debt” and “deficit” were mentioned.

News coverage focuses concern on issues covered. Media neglect results in important subjects failing to become subjects of concern.

Why isn’t the subject covered? Why is media neglect so prevalent on this problem. Is it not sexy, lurid or violent enough? Is this the result of editorial decisions made at the corporate level? This is a failure in journalism, an ethical failure. The lives of a sixth of Americans are of virtually no concern to the media. The vital issues of the day have to be covered for democracy to function. Media neglect harms our ability to have the knowledge to function as effective citizens.That is wrong.

Is poverty a serious issue? Look at this quote from the same study cited above.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2011 report (9/11), poverty in 2010 was at a 19-year high, affecting 46 million people, or 15.1 percent of the population. That’s up sharply from 11.3 percent in 2000, and 12.5 percent in 2007. And several groups feel the effects of poverty at a much higher rate than the national average. According to the 2011 census, more than one in five children (22 percent) live in poverty, as do more than a quarter of all blacks (27 percent) and Latinos (26 percent). A 2011 Brookings Institution study (9/13/11) predicted that as many as 10 million additional Americans will join the ranks of the poor by 2014.

The Census Bureau counts a single person under 65 as being in poverty if they make less than $11,702; for a family of four, the cut-off is $22,314 a year. These thresholds—calculated since the 1960s simply by multiplying estimated food costs by three—have been criticized for failing to account for the increased costs of necessities like housing, transportation and childcare, so the official poverty rates may grossly understate the number of families actually living in poverty. The National Center for Children in Poverty at Columbia University (6/08), for example, estimates that “families typically need an income of at least twice the official poverty level ($42,400 for a family of four) to meet basic needs.”

A recent AP report (7/23/12) summarized the dire predictions of economists, academics and think tanks about poverty’s current trajectory: “The ranks of America’s poor are on track to climb to levels unseen in nearly half a century, erasing gains from the war on poverty in the 1960s amid a weak economy and fraying government safety net.”

The economic status of 46 million people is important but these human beings are invisible. They have less media existence than a good car chase, a celebrity wardrobe malfunction or a funny cat video. The result is an impoverishment of political, commercial or religious dialogue. A critical matter is placed in the background of public discourse.

“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain” or in this case, 15% of Americans, fellow citizens, human beings, and brothers and sisters before the eyes of God. The marketplace of ideas is where Americans have traditionally found solutions to our problems. Impoverish our dialogue. Limit our thinking. Keep this issue off the front burner, and the problem will have little chance of any positive outcome. It will linger like the poor on the margins of our society.

Democracy thrives on the application of reason and judgment. When a subject is neglected to this extent, the dominant themes will be those based on myth, opinion or lies. There can be no defense if there is no discussion. Facts and evidence are little used and thus, welfare Cadillac’s and women having children to qualify for more money dominate the discussion.

The media should take its responsibilities seriously and give Americans a chance to consider the plight of the poor amongst us.

James Pilant

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

Is Wal-Mart a Criminal Enterprise? Read Ethics Bob’s Take on the Subject!

On By southwerkIn Business Ethics

Vast Mexico Bribery Case Hushed Up by Wal-Mart « Ethics Bob

The headlines are from Saturday’s New York Times. The news article details how Walmart de Mexico—that nation’s largest employer—regularly paid huge bribes to Mexican government officials to approve permits for new stores; how senior management of the Mexican subsidiary was party to the bribery; how Walmart headquarters in Arkansas investigated the allegations of bribery, and how, when the investigations turned up hard evidence, hq proceeded to bury it.

Vast Mexico Bribery Case Hushed Up by Wal-Mart « Ethics Bob

Ethics Bob is using Wal-Mart’s recent bribery problems as a subject for class discussion in his business ethics class. I am using it in my business classes as well. I would be curious as to his classes’ response. Mine has been that there will be long term consequences for the company. Ethics Bob is tough on the company and he’s teaching business ethics where I am teaching the more generic business law. He may be getting a more critical response than I.

James Pilant

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

Penn State Students Riot on Behalf of Morally Disgraced Coach

On By southwerkIn Business Ethics

A number of students at Penn State have rioted over the firing of legendary football coach, Joe Paterno. I am very disappointed in their behavior. From the grand jury report alone without any other media report, it is obvious that Paterno breached his moral duty by not reporting a cruel act of pedophilia and allowing the culprit to go free and possibly continue his criminal career for nine more years. Apparently some are arguing that since Paterno told his superiors, he had fulfilled his duty!

There was never any doubt in my mind that he and the college president had to be removed. The issues here are not grey, they are not indistinct; we are looking at a clear issue of right and wrong. These rioting Penn State students are making a statement here, that they do not understand the basic responsibilities of a citizen in our society.

From the New York Times –

After top Penn State officials announced that they had fired Joe Paterno on Wednesday night, thousands of students stormed the downtown area to display their anger and frustration, chanting the former coach’s name, tearing down light poles and overturning a television news van parked along College Avenue.

Now, let’s hear at least one person’s argument on behalf of the fired coach –

Again, from the New York Times story –

“I think the point people are trying to make is the media is responsible for JoePa going down,” said a freshman, Mike Clark, 18, adding that he believed that Mr. Paterno had met his legal and moral responsibilities by telling university authorities about an accusation that Mr. Sandusky assaulted a boy in a university shower in 2002.

Run this phrase from the paragraph above across your mind – “met his legal and moral responsibilities” Say it out loud and see if there is any way you can mean it.

There are those who believe when they have met the very least of their legal responsibilities, their moral duties are also fulfilled. I do not hold to that. My perception is that our moral responsibilities only begin there at the moral minimum of obedience to the law. We have duties to our fellow citizens and our nation. You could add duties to religion and civilization with no argument on my part.

I teach law enforcement courses. One of the principles of American law enforcement is public support. With the public’s active participation, law enforcement is not possible. The police do not cover enough ground that they can know about any worthwhile percentage of crime. So, the bedrock of American law enforcement is the willingness of citizens to provide information and sometime testify in criminal matters. Without that cooperation, we descend into chaos.

Did Joe Paterno violate the law? Here is the relevant portion of Pennsylvania statute in question –

§ 42.42. Suspected child abuse—mandated reporting requirements.

 (a)  General rule. Under 23 Pa.C.S. §  6311 (relating to persons required to report suspected child abuse), licensees who, in the course of the employment, occupation or practice of their profession, come into contact with children shall report or cause a report to be made to the Department of Public Welfare when they have reasonable cause to suspect on the basis of their professional or other training or experience, that a child coming before them in their professional or official capacity is a victim of child abuse.

 (b)  Staff members of public or private agencies, institutions and facilities. Licensees who are staff members of a medical or other public or private institution, school, facility or agency, and who, in the course of their employment, occupation or practice of their profession, come into contact with children shall immediately notify the person in charge of the institution, school facility or agency or the designated agent of the person in charge when they have reasonable cause to suspect on the basis of their professional or other training or experience, that a child coming before them in their professional or official capacity is a victim of child abuse. Upon notification by the licensee, the person in charge or the designated agent shall assume the responsibility and have the legal obligation to report or cause a report to be made …

Now I am definitely no expert in Pennsylvania law and there can be other statutes that may apply that I am unaware of. But based on what I have here I think it is pretty clear that under this disclosure law, Paterno fulfilled the state required minimum by reporting the incident to his superiors. Now be aware, the question as to whether or not a college football coach comes into contact with children so regularly that he has a reporting responsibility is a separate issue.

So he fulfilled his legal requirement based on a very simple layman’s interpretation of the law of the State of Pennsylvania. But did he fulfill his moral responsibility?

Let’s just make that second question as simple as possible? –

Do you call the police when you have discovered someone was anally assaulting a small boy in the locker room of your team?

If you can truthfully answer that with a “no,” I guess you have reason to riot.

James Pilant

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

Manufacturing Enemies

On By southwerkIn Business Ethics

“Pleas hellp,” Tudor Ureche, a college student who was participating in the U.S. government’s J-1 visa program, wrote in the email. He added that he was suffering from severe back pain from the work, and that his bosses said his temporary visa would be revoked if he complained.

Ureche never received a response. But two months later, at least 200 foreign exchange students walked out of the Pennsylvania factory in protest, saying they spent thousands of dollars to pay for their cultural exchange visa only to end up in grueling factory jobs. (The factory packed Hershey’s candy, but was operated by a subcontractor.)

You can find all this here from today’s Yahoo News.

The J-1 visa program was designed to give students from overseas a taste of the American way of life during the Cold War. Presumably, our honored guests would go home with a new appreciation of the wonders of manufacturing in this great nation. Well, times have changed. Now, we give students a taste of our current corporate decision making process. Our new welcome for these foreign students is a semi-minimum wage job from which room and board are deducted so they have even less money than when they came!

Don’t believe me? Here’s a quote from Yahoo News –

The J-1 visa program brings foreign students to the country to work for two months and learn English, and was designed in part to fill seasonal tourism jobs at resorts and seaside towns. The 400 students employed at a Pennsylvania factory that packages Hershey’s candies told The New York Times that even though they make $8.35 an hour, their rent and program fees are deducted from their paychecks, leaving them with less money than they spent to get the visas and travel to the country in the first place.

So, our brilliant, innovative and thoroughly patriotic corporate leaders using subcontractors take idealistic, impressionable youth from foreign cultures, uses them for cheap labor, bullying and abusing them in the process, and then sends them home. Wow, so it seems we Americans don’t have enough enemies in the world, we have to manufacture more of them?

Let’s be blunt. If bringing foreign youth here at their own expense and using them for semi-slave labor isn’t illegal, it should be. If this is in anyway, some weird throwback program to the Cold War, it needs to end now.

We Americans have a responsibility to treat our guests with a modicum of respect. Letting corporations, in particular, Hersheys’ sub-contractors do these things is wrong. It’s vile.

It’s bad enough that Americans have to deal with soulless corporate minions on a regular basis. Subjecting would be friends to these people is more than cruel, it is counterproductive.

James Pilant

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta

Photo reporters have feelings and souls (via Blognovic’s Weblog)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

I, too, believe that photo journalist are not getting the credit they deserve. The risks they take are not appreciated as we focus more and more on the strange talking heads that inhabit our media world.

With the recent deaths in Libya, we should all become more aware of the guts it takes to go into a shooting war with only a camera.

James Pilant

My thanks to Blognovic’s Weblog.

If you have read my post about Obama’s answer to Donald Trump during the Annual Dinner of the White House Correspondent Association, maybe you’ll know I found sensitive from his part to take some last and serious words to recognize the work of journalists in war zones. Some days after, when I found an article by Bill Keller, executive Editor of the New York Time who, after spending time reporting in conflict zones is now in charge of sending prof … Read More

via Blognovic’s Weblog

The True Grit Era

On By southwerkIn business ethics

This is from a Frank Rich column analyzing America in the light of the two True Grit films –

That kind of legal and moral cost-accounting seems as distant as a tintype now. The new “True Grit” lands in an America that’s still not recovered from a crash where many of the reckless perpetrators of economic mayhem deflected any accountability and merely moved on to the next bubble, gamble or ethically dubious backroom deal. When Americans think of the law these days, they often think of a system that can easily be gamed by the rich and the powerful, starting with those who pillaged Lehman Brothers, A.I.G. and Citigroup and left taxpayers, shareholders and pensioners in the dust. A virtuous soul like Mattie would be crushed in a contemporary gold rush even if (or especially if) she fought back with the kind of civil action so prized by the 19th-century Mattie.

Frontier justice. That would send the Wall Street gamblers packing, wouldn’t it? Of course, right now, I’d take just about any kind of justice. The current situation in the finance world if analogous to a movie would be Heaven’s Gate. In that film the villains after a murderous spree are tracked down by a posse from the local people and rescued by the cavalry on direct orders of the governor. That’s about the situations we have here.

James Pilant