Everything for a share and a click: On TV Informer they incite the crew to hit the uncle of a missing girl

(Source: N1) On the first day of the disappearance of a two-year-old girl, for a moment we thought that this story would not be misused by the media. But yesterday everything was the same, and the journalistic code was broken by the minute and it is still being violated. However, this time, a media outlet crossed every line.

Where other (TV) news crews were banned, the TV Informer crew was obviously allowed. Right next to the house of missing girl’s uncle. When he appears in person, journalist Jelena Rafailovic is live on the program.

Informer: Who are you?

Uncle: I’m Danka’s uncle, I live here, you don’t need to stand here or anything.

Informer: Well, we’re not filming your house.

Uncle: If you don’t move right now, I’m calling the (police) patrol.

Informer: We’re not filming your house, we can on the street, we have a problem here now, just to explain to the viewers, this is the uncle of Danka… He doesn’t want us to stand here on the street and film. Sorry, we’re here with the best of intentions.

Uncle: I don’t care, you don’t have to stand here.

Woman: Why are you here. Why don’t you go to their apartment?

Informer: Let me ask you how we can help you, ma’am.

And here the sound disappears, because this is what the informer video posting later looks like. In the live broadcast something else was heard.

“Hit him Rafa, hit him… It’s going to be good for the share, now Rafa hit him- you’ll see,” could be heard from the studio.

It’s good for a cameraman to hit a missing girl’s cousin – yes, that’s what was heard.

“It sounds more like an instruction you give to a participant in a reality show. Yes, that’s what the audience likes and what they’re going to click on, but is that why you exist as a media outlet? Well, that’s a good question that could perhaps be answered by (media outlet) Informer who does not even recognize the Code of Ethics of Journalists of Serbia, unfortunately,” says Ana Martinoli from the Press Council.

In non-recognition and disrespect of the journalistic code, Informer is not alone – only yesterday’s headlines in the tabloids testify best to this. From completely endangering someone else’s privacy to placing incorrect information – which had to be denied by the Ministry of interior.

“The Interior Ministry urges the media not to publish unverified and inaccurate information, because in this way they threaten the investigation, whose goal is to find the girl as soon as possible. The safety and finding of the girl is an absolute priority that is above all other interests,” the ministry said in a statement.

Unless the media judge that the disappearance of a two-year-old child is an ideal opportunity to win over the same public in someone else’s torment, sensationalism and public disturbance.

“Unfortunately, it seems to me that every subsequent event like this further pushes the boundary. In these situations, it is important first of all to protect the privacy and identity of those people who are threatened in this process, and then to protect the public from all those information and content that can disturb them,” Martinoli adds.

And then to separate facts from impressions, not to talk to people who are in a state of emotional shock, and to respect the code, if not journalistically, and the human one.

“When you don’t know what the code says, when you don’t know what to do, imagine that your child is missing. And if your child was missing, would you go around talking to the press right now?” says journalist Tamara Skrozza.

Author: Maja Nikolić