You Are a Journalist

You are a journalist for an up-and-coming online news website. You are inadvertently given some information that you know would increase your website's popularity, but could potentially compromise national security. How might you handle the story? Explain your decision.

If I were a journalist in this situation I definitely would not publish it at all. Not only would it be totally immoral and irresponsible my family would probably never have anything to do with me again. I come from a big family of military members and they believe that taking part in protecting our country in any way possible is every Americans responsibility. In this case I think that I would be willing to lose my job in order to protect something that I was taught to believe (almost like a religion).

Another good reason not to publish a story that could potentially compromise national security is that it would probably be illegal. If a person knows that they could publish something that could get thousands or even millions of Americans hurt and/or killed. I'm pretty sure they will go to prison for a very long time if they were the cause of something really bad happening. If it were bad enough they may potentially receive the death penalty.

I would probably take the story to my superior and present it to him. I would try to persuade him to get some sort of approval from our legal department on how much of the information would be allowed to be published. I would also ask that the story be published by someone other than me.

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