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A quietly disturbing lecture, one in a series:



BBC - Radio 4 - Reith Lectures 2002 - Lecture Five - License to Deceive



Rather to my surprise and I think ultimately my comfort, the classic arguments for press freedom do not endorse, let alone require, a press with unaccountable power. A free press can be and should be an accountable press.



Accountability does not mean censorship: it precludes censorship. Nobody should dictate what may be published, beyond narrowly drawn requirements to protect public safety, decency and perhaps personal privacy. But freedom of the press does not also require a licence to deceive. Like Mill we want the press to be free to seek truth and to challenge accepted views. But writing that seeks truth, or (more modestly) tries not to mislead needs internal disciplines and standards to make it assessable and criticisable by its readers. There is no case for a licence to spread confusion or obscure the truth, to overwhelm the public with 'information overload', or an even more dispiriting 'misinformation overload', let alone to peddle and rehearse disinformation.
The press, media, etc., certainly has a checkered and spotted past. Ultimately, the lecturer is calling for press accountability, that "[i]f we are to restore trust we shall have to start communicating in ways that are open to assessment, and to do this we need to rethink the proper form of press freedom. The press has no licence to deceive; and we have no reasons to think that a free press needs such a licence."



While I love the call for means of assessment, I am make uncomfortable by this notion of rethinking "the proper form of press freedom." That invariably means government regulation, and that unavoidably means government control, and so much for Amendment #1.



Fortunately, this is all happening in England. Let them be the test case.

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