A longtime resident of Uxbridge, Ted Barris has written professionally for 40 years - for radio, television, magazines and newspapers. The "Barris Beat" column began in the 1950s when his father Alex wrote for the Globe and Mail. Ted continues the tradition of offering a positive view of his community. He has written 16 non-fiction books of Canadian history and teaches journalism at Centennial College in Toronto.
No more immunity for social media
I walked into my History of Broadcasting class last Friday morning. I told the class - about 50 Broadcasting and Film students at Centennial College in Toronto - that I was tossing out the lesson plan that day. I suggested I had a more contemporary issue on my mind. But I didn't want to colour their responses. I simply asked for their take on the alleged gang rape of that student near Vancouver earlier in the week.
“It's revolting,” one male student said.
“I couldn't believe it,” a woman about the same age as the apparent teenaged victim said. “They even put it on the Internet.”
One male student kind of chuckled at the episode. I suggested that wasn't appropriate and gave him a chance to rethink his response. He corrected himself. Another young man wondered if the material was true.
In fact, over the weekend, the National Post published a story that presented the impressions of several other teens in Pitt Meadows, the suburb of Vancouver where the incident took place. They claimed the media had “misinterpreted” what happened at the rave party that night. The youths, who said they'd also witnessed the incident, claimed “the embarrassment of seeing the photos on Facebook prompted the girl to allege the assault,” according to the Post.
I agreed that many questions remained unanswered about the incident. But I pushed for my students' responses to the so-called “sharing” of images of the incident on Facebook via iPhone, Blackberry and other smart phones. Again, I didn't wish to influence their gut responses, so I just put it out there to see what would happen.
“What were they thinking?” one student finally said.
I suggested I didn't believe they were thinking at all. And when those students who wanted to have their say in my classroom had spoken, I offered a take on the event that probably surprised them as much as the horror of the alleged rape. I explained - if the incident were proven true - that I thought there were more criminals than just those who'd committed the assault. To me, anyone who captured images of the alleged rape… and/or anyone who subsequently shared the pictures with their social media pals… and/or whichever social networks - Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc. - that knowingly transmitted any of the images… or for that matter any of the smart phone networks that allowed publication of the pictures… was as guilty as the perpetrators of the assault.
In other words, I believe that any social media involved in making these images (as they say) “go viral,” could conceivably be considered criminally libel. At best, they're guilty of complete irresponsibility. At worst, I'm sure lawyers could argue in court, that social media networks added insult to the injury of the rape of this young woman. In my view, the middle ground is that we - mainstream journalists, media, government and the public - have allowed the frontiers of those popular social networks to go unregulated long enough.
I do not make these comments blithely. I have written in this column before about other apparent breaches of trust in the world of social media. I've mentioned the suggestion that President Obama was actually a radical Muslim… that Canadian folk music icon Gordon Lightfoot was dead… or that cosmic rays from Mars entering the Earth's atmosphere from Mars would cause an earthquake in the African nation of Ghana. All ridiculously false allegations. All carried without any attempt by social media owners or operators to edit for accuracy. And all considered (by many) to be true just because somebody read, heard or saw such statements and images on Facebook, Twitter or YouTube.
As a journalist, broadcaster and media watcher for nearly half a century, I have never advocated censorship. I'm not advocating it now. Nor would I ever suggest that any platform - whether conventional or new media - be suppressed in its pursuit of the truth. In Ontario's broadcasting and journalism schools we expend a great deal of time, effort and money training young communicators how to prepare their content, check its accuracy and filter it for potential libel or slander before releasing it for public consumption. By and large we succeed in graduating communicators who practise such ethical behaviour throughout their professional careers.
I think it's time the CEOs of social media networks and their prime clientele, the young communicators, businesspeople, artists and consumers of today, assumed moral responsibility for any and all that their social media transmit. It's got to start now. Social networks can no longer live in the daydream of ignorance and immunity.
As in the Wild West, some law and order must come.
