A rape crisis coordinator spoke briefly for Channel 5 about the long-term damage of rape. Channel 8 also used the speech as a springboard for a story about a drug education and prevention program provided in local schools by law-enforcement officials. The exodus of East Germans that week spawned a story, also on Channel 8, that provided comments from local residents of German birth or descent. No Asian faces appeared except those of Chinese demonstrators holding a 100-day memorial service for those killed in Tiananmen Square. The demonstrators showed up in newspaper photos and on one of the stations.
News media mirror their coverage area.
It's important to know where the image is distorted and where the accurate representation is troubling. For example, if more than 90 percent of the people in power in the Cleveland coverage area are white and male, that fact in itself might be deemed newsworthy. As well as holding mirror to the coverage area, news media magnify aspects that warrant community notice. Elliott is executive director of the Ethics Institute, Dartmouth College. The Newsletter On Journalism Ethics, vol.