Pants on fire, but it's legal

[khaosworks]

Appellate Court Rules Media Can Legally Lie.

On February 14, a Florida Appeals court ruled there is absolutely nothing illegal about lying, concealing or distorting information by a major press organization. The court reversed the $425,000 jury verdict in favor of journalist Jane Akre who charged she was pressured by Fox Television management and lawyers to air what she knew and documented to be false information. The ruling basically declares it is technically not against any law, rule, or regulation to deliberately lie or distort the news on a television broadcast.

On August 18, 2000, a six-person jury was unanimous in its conclusion that Akre was indeed fired for threatening to report the station's pressure to broadcast what jurors decided was "a false, distorted, or slanted" story about the widespread use of growth hormone in dairy cows. The court did not dispute the heart of Akre's claim, that Fox pressured her to broadcast a false story to protect the broadcaster from having to defend the truth in court, as well as suffer the ire of irate advertisers.

Not that I ever listened to what FOX had to say, but here's another reason.

Comments

[kaasirpent]

Television news shows are, basically, entertainment. That puts them in the same category with Springer and Hard Copy.

[umbran.livejournal.com]

Hm.
Okay, try this - maybe it is not illegal to lie in a news program. However, might it not be illegal to advertise a program that contains such lies as "news"? That would be fraudulent advertising, which is generally prohibited by law...

[pickledginger.livejournal.com]

Excellent! Yes, that should work.

Misleading copy

[sdorn.livejournal.com]

I don't know the source of the copy quoted above, but it's subtly but importantly different from the St. Petersburg Times story on the same event. According to the St. Pete Times, the Florida Court of Appeals never defended the actions of the local Fox station but noted that there was a difference between Akre's (the plaintiff's) complaints to the federal FCC, on the one hand, and the state statute's protection of whistleblowers. In other words, the Florida Court of Appeals never said it was acceptable for news organizations to deliberately include misleading information provided by an interested party to a story. Instead, what it said was that the statute protecting whistleblowers did not protect this party's alleged reporting of violations of federal guidelines (or maybe that was threatened reporting).

For those who want more information from the plaintiff's perspective, see the website created by a friend (of course).

Re: Misleading copy

[khaosworks.livejournal.com]

I don't think the appeals court was said in either story to have defended FOX's actions, nor was a conflict between state and federal legislation.

Essentially, the appeals court reversed the award because they found that the state whistle-blower statute did not apply in this case - because FOX had violated no "law, rule or regulation." In other words, while not explicitly saying that FOX's falsification of the news was correct, they did say that FOX's actions were not illegal, because the FCC policy against falsification was not a "law, rule or regulation" but a guideline.

One can plausibly argue, therefore, that it is implied that FOX can legally falsify the news.

Re: Misleading copy

[khaosworks.livejournal.com]

I must add though, that being said, even though the appeals court found the FCC policy is not a "law, rule or regulation", FOX's violation of FCC policy may lead it into dire straits in any case, since the FCC controls licensing. Assuming the FCC want to take any action.

[bardling.livejournal.com]

Legal or not - it's a very sad confirmation of rumours of irreliable TV news.

*sigh* *scared of who else is and/or will be lying and what about...

[filkerdave.livejournal.com]

There's a reason that I don't watch TV news, and why I get my news from sources 'round the world.

[teddywolf.livejournal.com]

I've known FOX to be unreliable for a while.

[figmo.livejournal.com]

How times have changed.

Back when I was at Metro Traffic a memo was circulated saying we weren't even allowed to make up traffic problems because there were laws against giving out false information.