News-Record.com

"So if you're the editor who is asked not to publish Prince Harry's whereabouts in Afghanistan, what do you decide?"

"... media and selected international outlets agreed not to report Harry's deployment in exchange for getting regular pictures, video and text of his day-to-day activities... "

This is a pathetic commentary on our amoral news media and gossip-addicted culture. Sick and sad.

Thanks for stepping up, cm. So that I understand, you would not have agreed to keep Harry's whereabouts quiet? Is that the same as saying you would publish that he was in Afghanistan?

Were I ever to work for a news organization that had the resources to send me over-seas, I would hope that I really wouldn't care whether Prince Whoever was over there, beyond the fact he was an officer like any other. But I don't get the whole British monarchy thing or why they haven't done away with it, other than they maintain some darned find tourist attractions in London.

I guess the roughly analogous situation might be if the son or daughter of sitting U.S. President was in the field. I can well imagine that U.S. news outlets would be asked to keep that quiet and I can't think that the embargoe would be effectively maintained for more than a couple days. It just doesn't sit right.

Makes me wish for the old days where the papers & press didn't publish what was just wrong to publish, like JFK's affairs and the Prince's whereabouts.

Naw...

Mark, when did you start hating America?

Sue, I'm dense. You would publish or wouldn't?

Man, they are just waiting for you to say what you would do so they can line up in the opposite. Don't you know that?

Sorry, JR, I didn't mean to be unclear.

NO, I would not publish. I wouldn't even consider publishing. I mean, who has to even think twice about that? The only possible motive I can think of for those who did publish is to sell papers, and as Sue said, it's "just wrong." And bargaining temporary silence for future press access? [Sigh.] That's just messed up.

"Sue, I'm dense. You would publish or wouldn't?"

Sometimes, I wax melodramatically about the 'old days' when there were 'gentlemen's agreements' about keeping certain information out of print because it was tasteless, didn't add to the public discourse or was just plain nosy (as opposed to newsy). There was an unwritten rule about not publishing salacious facts about some people and I guess you know what and when I mean.

As for Prince Harry's story, I don't think I'd have published it if it meant putting him and others in danger. There are reasons to keep military facts secret just like there are for police planning, stakeouts, stings and more. As for the slippery slope question, yes, it's a difficult moral and professional dilemma that is ongoing and not unique to this situation. If you don't publish this, do you publish stories about the Prince's more public events in clubs and bars? Of course you publish those stories. There's a difference between life-threatening exposure and drunk & disorderly.

But the US press observed a sort of self-regulated embargo about Chelsea Clinton (one that a child her age in her situation deserved) and in a way these two situations are analogous. Why was it OK to put Chelsea off limits and not this more life-threatening Prince Harry story?

Thanks. The old-fashioned, traditional stance of newspapers is to not publish if it would put innocent people in peril. Papers didn't publish and radio didn't broadcast troop movements during WWII, for instance.

In this case, I'm old-fashioned, too. I wouldn't publish his whereabouts because it would have put him in danger, and of course, it did.

I must admit, abcd, that I am surprised that more of the people critical of my stances on other instances in which we publish or didn't publish haven't weighed in.

I agree that certain information shouldn't be published other than the apparent enemy - who would gain what by knowing that this kid was deployed, and where?

I think there's something to be said for "what you don't know, won't hurt you."