Ethical constraints in the media industry are different and more complicated than the legal constraints because, whereas legal constraints are definite as they are written in law, ethical constraints are more the opinions of a certain person or company. There are not necessarily any guidelines that the people or companies concerned can follow, but rather, they should do the things that they can justify as correct or in the public's best interest. There are often guidelines that the company writes for its employees to follow, and in many cases, what the presenter, journalist, etc. does is allowed to go ahead as long as their boss says that it is acceptable, although it is not always seen as acceptable by the public.
Ethical constraints usually include:
- Representation of age, race, gender, religion, etc.;
- Protecting underage individuals;
- Interviewing vulnerable people;
- Anything that could be seen as harmful or offensive;
- Invading privacy;
- Influencing public opinion.
People working in the media industry must be aware of these constraints and should abide by them, however, this is not always the case. Often, ethical constraints are broken and people can be harmed or offended as a result. An example of this is the radio show that Russel Brand and Jonathan Ross presented, often referred to as "Sachsgate". In this show, they made a series of prank calls to actor Andrew Sachs after he failed to show up for an interview. These calls were offensive to the actor and his family, especially after the pre-recorded show was allowed to air by station controller Lesley Douglas, who quit after many complaints were recieved about the show. This case shows that although the ethical constraints are there, that they cannot be properly enforced and can be broken if a person in charge says that it's okay. This case is also, arguably, not as bad as it is seen to be. The BBC Editorial Guidelines state that, as radio does not have a watershed, "decisions should be based on the audience expectations of each radio service" and, as it was aired late at night, the audience listening found the show to be acceptable, there was even a warning beforehand. Complaints only came after The Daily Mail had reported it. Before this, issues were to be handled privately and not many people had really known about it considering the hour it aired. It is argued that the fallout from the show is due to the newspaper and not, in fact Radio 2's or the comedians involved.
