Ethics

        When it comes to visual media, my favorite is film. I could tell you what I’ve seen recently and which is my favorite. But, unfortunately those two aspects have not met the crossroad. However, to satisfy the question, “what is your favorite piece of media recently?” I’d have to say it’s the animated movie, UP. Besides the fact by society’s standards I’m way too old to have watched this film without the excuse of chaperoning a child, it actually had a lot of parallels to me and the people in my life at that present moment. The lead character, Carl, lost the love of his life, Ellie. He didn’t want to let go of his house that had memories of happy times. And, my Poppy (grandpa) was going through the same thing after my Nanny (grandma) died. In this movie I feel like I was the little boy, Russell. An over achiever with daddy issues that ultimately tries to help Carl embrace change. All these parallels made me feel like watching this film at my age wasn’t quite juvenile after all. It goes back to the basic idea of the world; everything is related to anything on some type of level. We as individuals are somehow connected to one another, whether it’s by the experiences we share, the music we like, or the physical features we possess.

       This film is ethically correct in my opinion. Ethical concerns would involve people being misrepresented, or lied to about the actuality of the production. Both the interviewed and viewer would be deceived in a sense. Ethics should always be thought about in producing a project, whether it’s directly confronting morals or telling a story where ethics should applied during the production.

     When talking about the basic issue of ethics in a documentary, or journalistic work it is a little more difficult to determine. When a reporter communicates their reasoning for an interview to witness thoroughly and the interviewee accepts, I feel that person fully understands the repercussions of their actions. For example, a report in this scenario does the interview and in the editing process hears that people are being harmed because these verbal exchanges...

Should he or should he not continue? Well, depends how you look at it. Yes, there is a very good chance the interviewee could suffer. But, in result if the report executes the project, the audience members who watched it and became aware of the situation will help those who have survived thus far. So, question is who do you save in a situation like this?

There is rarely a decision someone makes where everyone is a winner. This reflects a motto I live by especially when I’m in a dilemma myself, or judging others and their decisions.

One person’s hero is another person’s villain.

Realize… we are both.