Code of self -censorship

The Public Chamber is working on a chart of journalists in the bowels of the Public Chamber (OP) The new code of professional ethics of newspaper men and television men - a Charter of journalists. As it became known to the "Gazeta", in the fall of the public, two versions of the Charter will be offered at once: a short option and expanded, and already in January the journalistic community at the All -Russian conference will approve, as they hope for OP, this document. Experts believe that the Professional Community will reject the new code. But the authors of the document have far-reaching plans: they intend in legislatively to approve moral imperatives.

The developer of the New Charter is a specially created group “On Journalistic Ethics” under the Commission of the OP for communications, information policy and freedom of speech in the media.

The law on the boundaries of the permitted

According to Gazeta, its leader, editor -in -chief of the Delovoy Petersburg newspaper Oleg Tretyakov, the group has already monitored “all existing codes of professional ethics of journalists in the world” and has now begun to write the text of the Charter. “We have prepared a short version of the ethics code and complete. The first option will record the boundaries of the permitted, the second is a detailed plan of what it is recommended to do to reporters and what is impossible, ”says Oleg Tretyakov. According to him, the new document is unlikely to be radically different from the previous ones, but it reflects the realities of the present.

“The last code of ethics (approved by the Congress of Russian Journalists in 1994. -“ Gazeta ”) was accepted when there was neither the Internet nor the stock market. According to our Charter, the journalist must inform the owner what kind of shares he owns and where he has financial interests. ” Also, the OP Charter includes copyright issues, coverage of terrorist actions, and interethnic razor.

But most importantly, members of the chamber believe that "corporate standards earn money." “The situation is that not all people who work in the editorial offices are familiar with this document,” Tretyakov complains. So in the chamber there was a proposal to include in the Law on the media "An article on the mandatory availability of the Code of Professional Journalistic Ethics in each edition, along with the Charter of the editorial office." According to the report, which was at the disposal of the “newspapers”, OP also intends to organize a meeting with representatives of the legislative and judiciary in the near future, “in order to listen and take into account their proposals about whether the Code of Professional Ethics can be used as a tool or guide to a judge’s decision.” “We want to find out whether it is possible to introduce an ethics code into the body of the legislative framework,” Tretyakov confirmed. It is curious that the OP project does not have a clause on the relationship of journalists and the authorities. Oleg Tretyakov noted that this issue is regulated by the laws of the media and the access of information, therefore it is not mentioned in the Charter.

Nothing will change

None of the dozens of ethics codes created at different times was adopted by the journalistic community for the Holy Rules. As Boris Reznik, deputy chairman of the Duma Information Policy Committee on Information, noted the “newspaper”, not so long ago, the heads of electronic media also signed this kind of charter, and vowed not to show violence and “nudity” on TV channels. “We conducted a study on how this charter is performed, and realized that nothing has changed,” the deputy says.

One of the 1994 Congress participants, where the former Code of Professional Ethics of the Russian Journalist was adopted, the head of the Goving Foundation, Alexei Simonov, is sure that the current plans of the Public Chamber will also be liable. “Why did the previous codes not work? Because the environment did not accept this. A lot of non -intellectual people came to the profession, ”says Alexei Simonov.

In his opinion, it can be obliged to read the Code, but you cannot oblige it to fulfill it.

“Only certain rules can be implemented, and these rules will be aimed at restricting the journalist in the description of certain events, processes, cases, and so on,” the expert says.

Journalists will resist

Apparently, the Public Chamber is striving for such restrictions. Her intentions have already caused a flurry of critics in a professional environment. “For a long time, everything goes to ensure that there is such a law. Purpose: so that we all go under him and had something to present to us, ”said Andrei Vasiliev, former CEO of Kommersant. He is convinced that the law will act on the principle of suffrage: "Whoever needs to be imprisoned, but who does not need - will not be imprisoned." According to Dmitry Muratov, editor -in -chief of Novaya Gazeta, it is better to take legislatively ten commandments necessary for life, and not accept “all kinds of nonsense”. The head of the "Publishing House of Rodionov" Alexei Volin called the OP "absolutely meaningless" and all the decisions that she makes is also meaningless. “In our country there is a law on the media, you can get moral compensation for slander and violation of business reputation. In my opinion, this is quite enough. The Public Chamber seems to fall into even deeper idiocy than the CPSU Central Committee during the Soviet Union, ”says Volin. The editor -in -chief of the newspaper “Tomorrow” Alexander Prokhanov suggested: “It is necessary to introduce a item that excludes all kinds of charts and exterminates any attempt to additional superstructures over the law on the press.” And the editor -in -chief of Smart Money magazine Leonid Burshid generally stated: "Members of the Public Chamber are generally the last people from whom I would listen to ethical instructions."

The Public Chamber composes a charter of journalists. Would you enter this document in this document?

Alexander Abdulov / People's Artist of Russia:

“I would like the journalists not to lie, and even if they lied, then somehow kindly. If there is enough brain level and humor level, then it is possible to even do it with irony. And that would be wonderful! And if there are no brains, there is no humor, then it is better not to lie. No charters will help here! "

Valeria Novodvorskaya / Leader of the Democratic Union party:

“It is enough to observe the constitution and not close the media under all kinds of pretexts! I think that the introduction of anything to the Charter of Journalists in the country where NTV, TV -6 and TVS were sequentially destroyed is simply profanity.

I do not want absolutely nothing, no charter from the Public Chamber - the Servital Organ, controlled by the Kremlin. There is already a law on the media, the code of honor of journalists, and the anti-terrorist convention ... A bit too much for the country, located somewhere in 86th place in terms of freedom of the press. Typical Soviet propaganda, so there is no need to take any charters. It is clear that it is useless to appeal to the Public Chamber: she will accept everything that she is deduced. ”

Alexander Adabashyan / Wasteer artist, screenwriter:

“If there are absolutely specific things in this chart, then there will be meaning in this, and the common words will remain such.

For example, there is a charter of American producers. In all paintings, the American necessarily wins, and if there is a bad black man, then two good ones will be nearby. There are a lot of similar specific things that are adopted by the producers charter. According to her, the picture must be patriotic, and not in general words, but it specifically says what this is.

We probably have some kind of principled journalists, but they are units. And the rest, as we can judge on television, on the radio, and the writing press, are people engaged by someone for money. As soon as their owner changes, they instantly change the face of a newspaper or the same television channels.

The press can be independent if it does not depend on payment for its work, and this can never be. All the same, there will be an order - and the root of evil in this! For good money, any charter can be circumvented. ”

Vladimir Korenev / People's Artist of Russia, Professor:

“Journalists should have self -censorship and probably a court of honor, as the officers had before in the army. Then they could delete people from their community who profane journalism as an institution.

It is very difficult for a person to fight with an unscrupulous journalist. Behind him is a newspaper with sometimes a million circulation. In search of a sensation, he will give unverified information, let the “duck”, and a stain lies on a person all his life, and he cannot wash himself, because newspapers, as a rule, do not apologize. ”

Ksenia Sobchak / TV presenter:

“Even if it is written in the Charter“ Do not write a lie! ”,“ Don’t write for a red word! ”, Then still journalists will do this because it is their bread and the only affordable way to attract the attention of the reader. I constantly face the fact that they write a lie about me. Well ... this is life, this, unfortunately, is normal and this cannot be avoided. This is like slush in the fall, and we must treat this as evil, which is inevitable.

I myself am a journalist, I myself write articles for magazines and I know what is the temptation, when you do not have enough material, embellish something and immediately collect the audience. There is always a great temptation to do this, and it is really difficult to resist. But you must have the courage to write about what you see, and not about what you want to see, because these are two big differences. ”

05/29/2006 / Lilia Mukhamedyarova, Elena Ogneva, Rustem Falyakhov, the material was published in the newspaper No. 90 of 05.30.2006.