I would just like to say hi to everyone on the Internet! I have decided to start blogging about a variety of things starting of with Does PR have a duty to tell the truth? Keep an eye on here for many different views and ideas not only on this topic but for many more!
Hello world! Wednesday, Nov 3 2010
Uncategorized 5:22 pm
Hi Jen
PR is paid for by their employers to spin the facts to be favourable to those employers. Working in finance I see PR stories by banks and customers and know for a fact that the “truth”, whatever that is, is not on the agenda for either party. That is not to say that good PR involves outright lying but with excessive emphasis on the positives and suppression of the negatives to my mind the resukt is indistinguishable from lying. Just done in a way that minimises the risk of litigation.
A prime sector for this currently is around the possibility of global warming. Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truth” was issued to UK schools as an educational tool. One person objected to the inaccuracies and took the authorities to court. The judge’s findings are at http://www.newparty.co.uk/UserFiles/File/dimmocktranscript.pdf among other places.
Pretty damning stuff. Gore apparently feels it is right to distort the truth to get his message across. The end justifies the means. Except the end in this case has a lot of risk attached that he manages to avoid mentioning.
He treats his view as definitive and backed by solid science whereas it is far from that.
Caveat emptor. Don’t take anything at face value. Which is why the press and internet can be dangerous with its reliance on breaking news and headlines. Who has the time and energy to dig behind every story?
I believe there are at least two approaches here. The first is to ask why the employer is employing a PR person. What is their motive behind such a move as the employer could inform directly. Therefore the ethics to be questioned are those of the employer and not necessarily of the employed. The second concerns PR as a vocation. All socially active human beings are in PR whether employed in this capacity or not. Therefore ethically you would have to ask yourself the question whether if imparting the truth would cause the person(s) to carry out an act that may be harmful to themselves or others and also whether if giving out the information, although ethically correct, compromises your legal status.
My own feeling is that all PR employees need to be independant financially and politically of the company relating the information and that the company relating the information would have a legal obligation to use an independant PR company. This would then remove the suspicion that PR companies are professional misinformers and improve the ethics, and subsequent reputations, of all businesses using this system.
Response to David Johnson
That sounds very idealistic. How can the PR employees be financially independent of their clients? The client will pay fees that house that employee, pay their food bills, clothe their children. That is a powerful driver and distorter. I recall an Arthur C. Clarke scfi tale where aliens found it very amusing that companies on Earth advertised their own products. On the alien’s planet there was a centrally funded organisation that tested products and issues reports – rather like a giant Which I guess.
Here is a question. Is a client more likely to use a PR firm that has a reputation for truth or one that has sailed close to the wind? If both delivered excellent results in the past then why not be associated with that good reputation? But the repuation is a soft, nice to have benefit. Results count and sadly the less reputable PR outfit is going to be the one that delivers most often. It is all about the bottomline and measuring that in profit/cash terms, not feelgood factors.
Another questio. Apart from Max Clifford how many people could name a PR business? In which case the reputation of the PR business for ethical conduct is not a big factor. Use the one that delivers, however they do it. Sad but true, in the words of Metallica.