Ethics is a set of moral principles values appropriate conduct for individuals and organizations. Journalism is the activity or profession of writing for newspapers or magazines or of broadcasting news on radio or television. Journalists do not always have good work ethics.

Janet Cooke was an editor at the Washington Post. Cooke wrote an amazing story on an eight year old boy named Jimmy called, “Jimmy’s world”.  Cooke wrote this false story and published it as of it was a true story. In Jimmy’s World this fictional boy Jimmy was addicted to heroin. The eight year old boy had an description and a fake address. She lied about the college she attended, that’s where the lies began. Cooke received the Pulitzer Prize award for Jimmy’s World, and she knew that the story was a lie. Cooke had the whole world sympathizing over this young boy with statements like these. “Jimmy’s mother Andrea accepts her son’s habit as a fact of life”. It also states in the story, “He grabs Jimmy’s left arm just above the elbow, his massive hand tighty encircling the child’s small”. “The needle slides into the boy’s soft skin like a straw pushed into the center of freshly baked cake”. Is that good work ethics.

Stephen Glass worked at the New Republic and was an journalist.Over half of Glass’s articles were completely fictional or fabricated.In the meeting Chuck stated, “If you stay silent I’ll take that as suspicious”. ” If you do not answer that means that it is either partially fabricated or completely fictional”. Stephen wrote an article on hackers and that’s how he got caught. The things he wrote in the story did not add up. “show me the money, I want the money, hackers have agents to”. Glass said this hacker was on the table shouting these thing in the lobby of a company that was not open on Saturday’s. How could this be? Glass ended up confessing to all his faults. Glass then got fired and wanted to become a lawyer. He could not become a lawyer because his character was beeing questioned. In the 60 Minutes interview the interviewer stated, “how do I know that the person you are right now is real”. Glass responded saying, ” I can’t make you believe me all I can do is try”.

Bryan Williams was a Journalist/ Broadcaster for the NBC news. Williams lied on air about the event that occurred doing the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Williams claimed that he was on the plane that got shot at, when indeed he was on the other plane. Is this slander? There was belief that he is suffering from PTSD (Post traumatic Stress Disorder). Williams stated, “I made a mistake in recalling the events of 12 years ago”. “I want to apologize”, stated Williams Wednesday on the Nightly News. He was suspended for six months with no pay and had is Peabody award coverage for Hurricane Katrina investigating.

As I’ve shown in the previous paragraphs all journalists do not have good work ethic. having bad work ethics takes everything away from you such as character and credibility.