More news outlets have announced they aren’t going to show certain cartoons from the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, whose offices were attacked this morning.
As iMediaEthics previously reported, several news outlets have avoided publishing any cartoons from the magazine. The Associated Press said it won’t publish any “provocative images.” CNN said it won’t show close-up images of the cartoons. The New York Daily News and Telegraph both blurred or cropped to avoid showing the cartoons.
The New York Times, ABC News, Fox News, NBC News, CNBC and MSNBC won’t publish some of the cartoons, CNN Money reported. (See iMediaEthics’ earlier list of outlets and their handling of the cartoons.)
The New York Times said it will just be “describing the cartoons,” instead of publishing them, CNN reported.
Times spokesperson Eileen Murphy provided iMediaEthics with the paper’s statement on the matter: “Under Times standards, we do not normally publish images or other material deliberately intended to offend religious sensibilities. After careful consideration, Times editors decided that describing the cartoons in question would give readers sufficient information to understand today’s story.”
NBC News, and ABC News told BuzzFeed’s Rosie Gray they wouldn’t show the cartoons, Gray tweeted.
NBC News told Gray, “Our NBC News Group Standards team has sent guidance to NBC News, MSNBC, and CNBC not to show headlines or cartoons that could be viewed as insensitive or offensive.”
Despite an earlier tweet from BuzzFeed’s Gray saying that CBS News said it wouldn’t show the cartoon, CBS News spokesperson Kelli Halyard told iMediaEthics by phone that CBS hasn’t ruled out using the images.
“CBS News will make an editorial decision about showing the Prophet Muhammad cartoons based upon the relavancy to the story,” Halyard told iMediaEthics.
A Fox News spokesperson told the Washington Post’s Erik Wemple even though it did show one image of a cartoon this morning, it doesn’t intend to air anymore.
iMediaEthics has written to NBC News, ABC News, and Fox News for comment.
The AFP isn’t blurring images from Charlie Hebdo cartoons, even though other outlets, like the New York Daily News have re-published AFP photos and then added pixellation, as iMediaEtics has reported.
AFP news editor, North America, tweeted today that “If your paper uses an AFP pic of Charlie Hebdo and it’s pixelated that’s their choice.” He included an uncensored image of a Charlie Hebdo cover image.
Bloomberg, the Huffington Post and the Daily Beast have published numerous images of Charlie Hebdo cartoons, Politico added.
“Other outlets like Bloomberg, The Huffington Post and The Daily Beast are going in the opposite direction, publishing slideshows of some of Charlie Hebdo’s most provocative cartoons,” Politico reported.
Meanwhile, French advocacy organization Reporters without Borders called for media to publish Charlie Hebdo‘s cartoons to show “deepest solidary” with the magazine.
Reporters without Borders wrote, “In response to today’s shocking attack on the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo that cost 12 lives, Reporters Without Borders issues an international appeal to media editors to begin publishing Charlie Hebdo’s cartoons tomorrow.”
Noting that “Charlie Hebdo has always put its fight for freedom of information first,” Reporters without Borders argued, “In the name of all those who have fallen in the defence of fundamental values, let us continue Charlie Hebdo’s fight for free information.”