The Washington Post has published a lengthy story detailing discrepancies in the Rolling Stone’s story on an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia.
One sentence that explains what went wrong in Rolling Stone’s rape story
(Bob Michal / Flickr)
It’s worth reading in full, but there is one sentence that jumps out especially as an indictment of where the Rolling Stone story went wrong. Gabriel Malor pointed it out on Twitter:
Publishing a story about a rape victim against her will is dangerous, and arguably unethical, journalism. It goes completely against the DART Center for Journalism and Trauma, a respected advisory group at Columbia University’s Journalism School, guidelines for how to report on sexual assault. There is an entire section that directs reporters to “respect a potential interviewee’s right to say no.”
“Be fair and realistic. Don’t coerce, cajole, trick or offer remuneration,” the guidelines instruct.
If Rolling Stone published the story against Jackie’s will, that is a terrible mistake on the magazine’s part — and a violation of the ethical guidelines reporters should follow when reporting difficult, and sensitive stories about rape. And it’s coupled with the fact that Rolling Stone didn’t track down the accused rapists. As Erik Wemple wrote at The Washington Post:
Even if the accused aren’t named in the story, Erdely herself acknowledges that "people seem to know who these people are." If they were being cited in the story for mere drunkenness, boorish frat-boy behavior or similar collegiate misdemeanors, then there’d be no harm in failing to secure their input. The charge in this piece, however, is gang rape, and so requires every possible step to reach out and interview them, including e-mails, phone calls, certified letters, FedEx letters, UPS letters and, if all of that fails, a knock on the door. No effort short of all that qualifies as journalism.
A story where the main source tried to back out and the other participants were never interviewed is not a solid story. But Rolling Stone ran it anyway.
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