{"id":7570,"date":"2023-07-31T12:12:10","date_gmt":"2023-07-31T09:12:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cje.org.ua\/?post_type=news&p=7570"},"modified":"2023-07-31T12:12:11","modified_gmt":"2023-07-31T09:12:11","slug":"regarding-the-ukrainska-pravda-story-about-the-incident-with-russian-music-in-lviv","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/cje.org.ua\/en\/news\/regarding-the-ukrainska-pravda-story-about-the-incident-with-russian-music-in-lviv\/","title":{"rendered":"Regarding the Ukrainska Pravda Story about the Incident with Russian Music in Lviv"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Background<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On May 13, 2023, the Commission on Journalistic Ethics received a complaint from Yana Salakhova about the material of Ukrainska Pravda online publication called \u201cFans of Leps Who Responded to Comments Aggressively Received Summonses\u201d of May 9, 2023, available at https:\/\/www.pravda.com.ua\/news\/2023\/05\/9\/7401309<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The material, which is a news story, tells about two young men who listened to Russian music loudly on May 7 and attacked a passer-by who filmed this on video. Subsequently, the young men received military summonses. The text of the article contains information about the age and territorial origin of the two participants in the incident, the fact that they received summonses and had a report drawn up against them for hooliganism, as well as a video of their apology. The story included an embedded post of Lviv Oblast Patrol Police, which actually originally contained the personal information of alleged perpetrators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The applicant believes that the indication of the place of residence of potential offenders is discriminatory because after its publication on the Facebook page, the online media outlet had an influx of comments with hostile sentiments towards internally displaced persons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On June 20, 2023, the Commission appealed to the online media with a request to provide comments regarding violating the requirements of paragraph 15 of the Ethics Code of the Ukrainian Journalist in their story and the arguments specified in the complaint. In the response provided by the editor-in-chief of Ukrainska Pravda Sevhil Musaieva on June 28, 2023, the publication indicates that information was used as stated by the National Police, which published it in the original source.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Relevant ethical standards<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to paragraph 15 of the Code of Ethics for the Ukrainian Journalist, \u201cNo one shall be discriminated against on the grounds of sex, language, race, religion, national, regional or social origin or political opinion. Relevant features of a person (group of people) should be indicated only in cases where this information is an essential part of the material. It is necessary to refrain from hints or remarks concerning physical defects or diseases of the person, to avoid use of offensive expressions, profanity.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Regarding violations of the requirements of the Code, p. 15<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Paragraph 15 of the Code serves as one of the main safeguards against the spread of hate speech in media materials. The scope of this prohibition as a standard of journalistic ethics is broader than the scope of the legislative prohibition on the dissemination of hate speech and requires journalists and media to refrain from indicating protected personal characteristics except when it may serve the public interest or be otherwise justified in the material. At the same time, the legislative exemption of the media from responsibility for the dissemination of information previously shared by law enforcement or other state bodies is also not an excuse for the media to provide information without additional analysis of whether it can cause harm. This is one of the functions of the media \u2014 serving the interests of society and being committed to the principle of \u201cdo no harm.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this material, Ukrainska Pravda indicates the region of origin of alleged perpetrators. On the one hand, publishing this information is not sufficient for direct identification of the alleged perpetrators without the use of the published video of their apology. On the other hand, in the context of issues with reintegration of internally displaced persons which have existed since 2014, emphasizing that people who were loudly listening to Russian music in downtown Lviv came from the eastern and southern regions can provoke further polarization and deteriorate people\u2019s readiness to join forces and fight against challenges to Ukraine\u2019s independence together. This indication may reinforce existing stereotypes and contribute to their solidification. In addition, it is difficult to justify the general purpose of including this information in the material and its added value. In view of this, the Commission considers the publication of information on the regional origin of the young men to be unjustified and to violate the requirements of paragraph 15 of the Ethics Code.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion and recommendations<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In view of the above, the Commission believes that Ukrainska Pravda\u2019s article \u201cFans of Leps Who Responded to Comments Aggressively Received Summonses\u201d of May 9, 2023, violates the requirements of the Ethics Code of the Ukrainian Journalist, paragraph 15, and thus issues a warning to the media outlet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To improve counteraction to hate speech, the Commission recommends that journalists and the media:<\/p>\n\n\n\n