The Society of Professional Journalists is updating its Code of Ethics to address modern challenges like AI and content creation. Yet, they continue to ignore a fundamental ethical failure inside their own leadership ranks.
Noticeably absent from their ethics discourse is any accountability for SPJ leadership actively amplifying ruzzian disinformation.
I thought about the NYC Chapter’s Membership Director last night—specifically her statement to me: “I don’t think Ukrainians really want peace” after a horrific attack on Kyiv in 2024.
I thought about her words again last night, as I tried to sleep on the cold concrete floor of a bomb shelter in Kyiv, where I ran to after listening to explosions echo around my apartment after yet another ruzzian ballistic air assault (third one this week).
I thought about the old grandmothers and the mothers with little children huddled, trying to sleep on that cold concrete floor beside me.
I thought about the disabled woman two doors down from my apartment who physically cannot reach a shelter—who has no choice but to lie in bed and hope a ballistic missile doesn’t strike her building tonight.
I thought about all the tears and hugs I’ve witnessed from grieving families with loved ones lost or in jeapordy at the front lines—people who are defending themselves against a dystopian aggressor for one simple reason: to be left alone.
It is the height of hypocrisy and arrogance for SPJ leadership to position themselves as arbiters of journalistic ethics while pretending this never happened. They preach high-minded standards while someone in their own leadership ranks blames the victims of war and brutality, claiming “these people don’t really want peace.”
I wish this director would come with me for just one week to Ukraine. I’d love to see if she still comfortably sits in New York and decides whether “these people really want peace.”
Journalism ethics aren’t abstract guidelines for new technology; they start with factual integrity, accountability, and refusing to amplify state propaganda within our own professional institutions.
#SPJ #DeadlineClub #JournalismEthics #PressFreedom #Ukraine #FactBasedJournalism
