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Smash His Camera is a documentary film about Ron Galella who was a photographer that went to extreme measures to get the best possible shots he could. He was famous because of the way he took his photos, it was an art for him and he mastered it, which sometimes led him to some rough places. In two instances, Galella found himself in a court room. Galella’s first incident was due to a celebrity, Marlon Brando broke Galella’s jaw, he then filed assault charges against Brando. The second incident that led him to court was when he filed suit against Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and the Secret Service agents that were protecting her; they had falsely arrested and prosecuted him and also interfered with his pursuit of trade. In this particular case, Galella didn’t end up winning because the court found that Galella was harassing Onassis and causing emotional distress. Even though he was in his rights to photograph Onassis because she was a public figure in a public place, Galella did not do it within the bounds of the law.

When it comes to my opinion on Galella, I personally believe he was just doing his job to the best of his ability and thats what everyone does with their job, no matter what they are doing. Galella’s job was to provide people with the best photos of celebrities doing the wrong thing because that would create the most publicity. Even though at times he had to step over some of the ethical lines to get the best photo, that was his job to do so.

I believe Ron Galella put paparazzi on the map in a sense and added a whole other element to media journalism. Since this major case happened between Galella and Onassis, there have been more and more. There are tons of cases of celebrities filing suits against paparazzi because of harassment and trespassing. One great example of this is Harry Styles, of the boy band, One Direction, winning a court case two years ago against the paparazzi because of harassment. This just shows you that there is a ethical and legal line on what is too far when it comes to taking pictures of these celebrities.

All in all, this is a great documentary that all people in media journalism should watch. I personally believe that paparazzi do care about the people even though sometimes it looks like they are going too far for their job, but at the same time, thats what society wants to see. We the people want to see celebrities doing something wrong, funny or just seeing them as normal people in society. Yes, there are some ethical issues when it comes to this job, but i think thats something everyone needs to understand that certain lines are going to be crossed, but at the end of the day, it’s a business about money and serving the people.

Sources

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/10520656/Harry-Styles-wins-court-order-against-paparazzi-harassment.html

Smash His Camera

The movie Nothing But the Truth deals with a lot of journalism issues. The two most important issues that relate to topics we have discussed in class are shield laws and ethics.

Shield law is to protect journalists against the government requiring them to reveal confidential sources or other information. Rachel has complete confidentiality with her source and has the right to protect that throughout the film, but very quickly she ends up in jail because her story gives the identity of a CIA operative. The reason she is jailed for this because it is a federal crime to reveal a CIA operative under the Intelligence Identities Act. The whole situation of Rachel being in prison could of been avoided the whole time if she was willing to give up her source, but she refused to do so and in the process many lives were ruined.

In saying that, this is where ethics come into play. Was it even ethical in the first place to have a young girl be a source in such a big case? The answer for me is no, the reason I think that is because it seems unfair for that child to have that kind of pressure on her at such a young age. It just seems ethically wrong to put that on a young child, this is something that could destroy the rest of her life. Also, the whole story ruins not only Erica’s life, but also Rachel’s. While in prison, Rachel’s life seems to unravel because she’s been behind bars for so long, her husband starts to see someone else because he believes that she will be in prison for a long time because he knows she won’t give up her source. A great quote in the film by Rachel sums up what kind of journalist she is “any real journalist would be prepared to put up with the discomfort of jail to protect their principle.”As we all know Ericas life is completely ruined throughout the film, everything she used to do is now jeopardized because of this story. She can’t even read to kids anymore because they don’t want her around the children, they think it could be dangerous. Eventually Erica’s life is taken from her because of the whole story, so it just comes back to Rachel’s decision and how it was ethically wrong.

The SPJ code of ethics has two principals that stand out in this case, minimize harm and be accountable. As a journalist I believe Rachel strayed away from these principals in order to make a name for herself as a journalist. Therefor, in the end of it all she lost a lot of what she had before the whole situation and ruined not only her reputation and life, but also Erica’s and the rest of the people who were involved.

Sources

4.2 Journalism Ethical Frameworks

Journalism lectures 8.1

Film “Nothing But The Truth”

http://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp

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