Evolving Collective Intelligence by Tom Atlee

Exploring how to generate the collective wisdom we need

Exploring how to generate the collective wisdom we need

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Candida International

What Does MHRA Stand For??

Bono and Bush Party without Koch: AIDS Industry Makes a Mockery of Medical Science

Profit as Usual and to Hell with the Risks: Media Urge that Young Girls Receive Mandatory Cervical Cancer Vaccine

 

Health Supreme

Multiple sclerosis is Lyme disease: Anatomy of a cover-up

Chromotherapy in Cancer

Inclined Bed Therapy: Tilt your bed for healthful sleep

 

Share The Wealth

Artificial Water Fluoridation: Off To A Poor Start / Fluoride Injures The Newborn

Drinking Water Fluoridation is Genotoxic & Teratogenic

Democracy At Work? - PPM On Fluoride

"Evidence Be Damned...Patient Outcome Is Irrelevant" - From Helke

Why Remove Fluoride From Phosphate Rock To Make Fertilizer

 

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Islanda, quando il popolo sconfigge l'economia globale.

Il Giorno Fuori dal Tempo, Il significato energetico del 25 luglio

Rinaldo Lampis: L'uso Cosciente delle Energie

Attivazione nei Colli Euganei (PD) della Piramide di Luce

Contatti con gli Abitanti Invisibili della Natura

 

Diary of a Knowledge Broker

Giving It Away, Making Money

Greenhouses That Change the World

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July 16, 2005

Protect Sources or Not? - More Complex than It Seems

Should the media and the legal system protect unethical powerholders who illegally leak information as part of their power manipulations? If they are protected, doesn't that degrade democracy? If they are exposed, wouldn't that make ethical whistleblowers less likely to leak vital information to the public, also degrading democracy? The answers to these questions play out differently in a polarized adversarial political environment and in a culture of dialogue and deliberation.

I've read a number of articles recently from responsible journalists who question the journalistic justification for reporters protecting confidential sources in the Valerie Plame case. (Notable among those articles are "Karl Rove and the access of evil: Tell us your 'source,' Judy" by Greg Palast and "Why this journalist thinks that Judy Miller should go to jail" by Will Bunch.) Among other excellent points, they argue that the "protection of sources" ethical principle is intended to protect those who challenge entrenched powerholders, not to protect powerholders from being answerable to the public.

This is one of those times when I tend to agree with the logic of the argument, but fear that nuanced arguments have little bearing in a charged political environment where people see and frame things in stark terms. There is a common sensibility that moral principles and rules apply to everyone, regardless. Changing the standards for a particular person or type of person or for special circumstances can be considered a "slippery slope" -- especially in polarized environments where any slight shift or nuance on one side is instantly attacked by the other, setting up feedback loops that speed our descent down the slippery slope.

In those circumstances,
failure to protect powerholder sources could very well create a climate where whistleblowers, too, will be to afraid to come forward, fearing they, too, will not be protected. In this dynamic, unethical powerholders win, either way.

So in the midst of my mixed feelings about all this, I return again to the need for a culture of dialogue and deliberation, an institutionalization of -- and widespread respect for -- thoughtful consideration of all views. It is not so much the specifics that are destroying democracy. It is the deeply adversarial spirit that undermines any sustained effort on behalf of the common good. I sense that it is THAT that most needs to change.

In a culture of dialogue and deliberation, systems of answerability (like investigative reporting) would serve to create a level playing field that supports ethical powerholders and ethical whistleblowers alike. A culture of dialogue and deliberation -- in which diverse sides of issues are well heard -- would replace attack/defense/cover-up dynamics with shared exploration, shared responsibility, and shared learning.

 


posted by Tom Atlee on Saturday July 16 2005
updated on Saturday September 24 2005

URL of this article:
http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/tom_atlee/2005/07/16/protect_sources_or_not_more_complex_than_it_seems.htm

 

 

 


Related Articles

Whole System Learning and Evolution -- and the New Journalism
A few days ago I stumbled on a new model for whole-system intelligence inspired by some work my friend Peggy Holman is doing with Journalism that Matters. These journalists are reexamining the kinds of stories they tell and their role in democracy, especially in light of how the rise of bloggers and other citizen journalists challenges mainstream media. Journalism that Matters is trying to revision that challenge into a create... [read more]
May 08, 2008 - Tom Atlee

Blog Power vs Media's Breathless Irrelevancies
The Downing Street Memo story provides an object lesson in (a) skewed media coverage -- especially when compared with the Michael Jackson story -- and (b) the competitive dynamics between blogs and mass media.... [read more]
June 27, 2005 - Tom Atlee

Citizen Journalism vs Framing Issues for Deliberation
Bruce Wilson is a programmer interested in citizen journalism. I talked with him about my idea for citizen journalists to co-create wikipedia-like multiple-viewpoint online databases summarizing and giving access to the range of views on news events, public statements and issues in general. I was looking for software that could facilitate that, so that anyone could participate in a relatively unmanaged, self-organized way. I learned some interesting things from... [read more]
May 01, 2005 - Tom Atlee

 


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These articles are brought to you strictly for educational and informational purposes. Be sure to consult your health practitioner of choice before utilizing any of the information to cure or mitigate disease. Any copyrighted material cited is used strictly in a non commercial way and in accordance with the "fair use" doctrine.

 

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