Sunday Life contributor wins Press Council ruling over editing of her copy
Commissioned expert contributors to magazine articles are entitled to redress via the Australian Press Council if their views are not properly reflected, a new ruling has demonstrated.
Sunday Life magazine – which is inserted in Fairfax Media’s Sun-Herald and Sunday Age – had a complaint upheld against it after homeopath Ana Lamaro said that her views on post natal depression were not fairly put.
Her contribution came in Caitlin Chang’s “What’s the alternative?” column. According to the APC ruling:
Ms Lamaro complained to the Council that the column misquoted and misrepresented her. She had been shown a proposed draft and had agreed to some editing of the response to the question, which she had been commissioned by the column to provide. But the published version, which had not been checked with her, omitted further material that she regarded as of great importance to an accurate expression of her expert opinion and also added material from another source with which she did not agree.
The paper had included in the copy the phrase: “”there are several antidepressants that are compatible with breastfeeding”. According to the APC: ” This statement was not written by her and is a point of view that she does not hold.”
The APC ruled:
“Any changes in wording provided by Ms Lamaro should have been specifically authorised by her. The magazine has conceded this point but, without any reasonable excuse, refused to publish a correction or clarification. It has also not provided any reason why the material, which it wished to add from another source, could not, and should not, have been clearly distinguished from the words attributed to Ms Lamaro. Accordingly, the Council considered the errors made in publication, and the failure to provide a correction or clarification, as thoroughly unacceptable and it upheld the complaint.”
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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Makes perfect sense, but columns are about cms, not content.
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This is a frustrating issue, journalists should not have to show their copy before print and sometimes people just talk rubbish and quotes need to be changed.
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Someone’s not going to be commissioned to write anymore cms!
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Sarah L – I agree it’s a frustrating issue, and that journalists should not have to show their copy before print (though where I work I have to), and that people OFTEN talk rubbish; however, I thought it was against the journalists’ code of ethics to change quotes without permission. If I get something that’s rubbish I either paraphrase or go back to the source with changes. Just because we’re journalists and some people talk crap doesn’t give us the right to put words in their mouths.
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Fire or outsource legions of good subs, as fairfax has done, and this is what happens
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Lu – I get your point, but at times, people talk in sentences that just don’t make sense and it’s unfair on the reader if they have to read quotes that don’t make sense and it’s embarassing for the person who is being quoted in the article.
If we had to go back and ask every single person that we slightly changed a quote of permission, it would take a ridiculous amount of time and people get into these over important moods and want to then change more and complain about little words here and there, it’s just not worth it. That’s the media and if someone is speaking to a journalist, they need to be careful with their words and be aware of what can happen.
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