Troubled...

I don't usually comment on stuff but I did some research on this for my Comm Research Methods class and it sorta bothers me.....

Quite simply, the question is, "Should a journalist interfere if he/she could?"

I mean, a journalist's job is to report on the news story....they are not supposed to interfere. Yet..how can they, as human beings, sit by and watch on as others suffer?
I understand that sometimes, there is no point in helping and sometimes, the journalist cannot even help probably because they are one against many. However, there are those Pulitzer prize-winning dudes that don't even want to try!!! How can that be right???

For example, you get a call one night and someone tells you that he is gonna burn himself alive in protest. The next day, you lug your camera to the spot and there he is, surrounded by other journalists. In front of your eyes, he douses himself with oil and sets himself on fire. Do you keep on filming him as he dies in agony? Wouldn't you try to help him? He wanted to protest something...it was not supposed to be suicide!! (Btw, this is a case that happened in Malaysia!!) He was going to jump into a water tank that was supposed to be there!! So, the man died and the journalists got their story. But how can they live with themselves????

I just don't get it!! In another case.. this Pulitzer prize-winning dude went to Rhodensia to document the mass murder of innocent black civilians. Knowing he could at least have done something, or at least saved a few lives, he simply sat back and watch impassively, as the regiment he had joined massacred a village of women and children!! I understand that as one against many, he could not have done much....but at the very least he could have saved ONE life!! But noooooo for the story, he sat and watched.... I dunno...this thing bothers me.

I suppose it is a matter of opinion...or of ethics...but seriously!! I support, and quote, John Long when he said,
"If I place myself in a situation in order to make photographs but find instead a need to help another person, it is my obligation to lay my camera down and help. My job (which is 8 hours a day) requires me to be fair and accurate. My humanity (which is 24 hours a day) requires me to be my brother's keeper."