Truth or Dare?

[Richard Whipple]

At the risk of exposing myself as the PR obsessive I am, the flap about Scott McClellan (who?) inspires this poll.  As hindsight and history shows us, McClellan's client was not the standard bearer of Truth. We now know McClellan's public relations job description implicitly or explicitly included obfuscation of the Truth: he was the messenger of lies; has felt remorse for his action in transmission; and has written a book on the experience. (Buy it from this LINK and make our good Forum webmaster rich, please.)

The PRSA would have the ("dumbed down") public believe McClellan is an anomaly in public relations work; that the market buys only the highest “gold standard” of truth telling from the industry.  The top industry association espouses this belief despite the facts to indicate otherwise; facts which led Dr. Edward Bernays (one of the guilty) to call for licensing of the profession.

Despite the communications innovation that is The Internet, the PRSA believes the public is uninformed about modern industry founders like Ivy Ledbetter Lee – who was investigated by the US Congress.  Lee’s august client list included John D. Rockefeller’s Colorado Fuel and Iron Company and the sitting President’s grandfather, Prescott Bush, who was embroiled with the Standard Oil, IG. Farben, and Hamburg-Amerika line money-making war scheme in the 1940’s, which directly led to Ivy Lee’s disgrace.  Or Edward Bernays himself, whose seminal book, Propaganda, sits proudly on many a PR bookshelf. (c.f. 7-minute video below)

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/sZ8ZvYNlxiM" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/sZ8ZvYNlxiM</a>                <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Xzf0eswdVkU" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/Xzf0eswdVkU</a>     

The PRSA asserts, by its opposition to the CBS Sunday Morning commentary, that no market exists for such “unemployable” PR staff, like Lee and Bernays.  The smug intimation is that you’re an idiot if you don’t understand it the PRSA way: PR's are more inherently truthful than the average employee.  (Again, the point being made is that practitioners like McClellan - and now Bernays and Lee - are anomalies.)

Am I the only one that has ever refused a client?  Do the indemnity clauses in our contracts exist because we explicitly trust The Truth originating from the client we represent? Do we trust the client’s truth enough to stand next to them in a courtroom?

The PRSA’s reasoning that “professionalism is simply good business” helps the PRSA present a reasonable conclusion based upon a faulty syllogism that 1) liars are unemployable because there are no market forces to employ them and 2) publicists would lose credibility with the press by lying to it, which is different than the reality in the statement: by being caught in a lie.  It would certainly depend upon the plausible deniability, manufactured before delivery, to know the lie was a lie when it was conveyed, for a lie to be forgiven.

The difference in syntax between the acts of lying and of being caught in a lie is the function of the relativism philosophy handmade to serve truth benders: to talk oneself out of almost any absolute belief absolutely.  And Truth is an absolute we can shade.

The less absolute The Truth, the less truth The Truth contains, and the relative discussion falls onto a pointed kaleidoscope made up of infinite situational and circumstantial probabilities like watching a gladiator impale himself on his own s'Word.  The Truth becomes impotent the less it is adhered to.

And the mainstream news media are doing a fine job keeping the Viagra away from journalism by reporting rumour as truth and sensationalizing the colour of underpants Paris Hilton is wearing.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/MTN3s2iVKKI" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/MTN3s2iVKKI</a>        <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/6VdNcCcweL0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/6VdNcCcweL0</a>         

When a journalist stands up for journalism, as Mika Brzezinski did on live television, what should her professional colleagues do?  Do you suppose they rally around her?  What was a more comfortable reaction for them to do?  Do you suppose they would act differently if the stakes were higher?  Or would Arthur Jensen call her into his boardroom and explain things so clearly that she, too, would see the face of God by the banker’s light?

To look at this in perspective, ask yourself, what would Edward R. Murrow do?  Those old enough to remember him would tell you he would have lit the papers for her from his own ever handy lighter.  He did caution his professional colleagues: Our major obligation is not to mistake slogans for solutions.  [Do you know that the name <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/sfaNCl2S6CY" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/sfaNCl2S6CY</a> EDWARD R MURROW is not known to graduates of journalism at the University of Warsaw? That’s a shame.] 

To get ink these days requires sensationalism not just newsworthiness or even truth.  In fact, truth is an over used and under appreciated word: like those of us who are overworked and under paid.  Few words, like sensationalism, remind me of another larger-than-life former journalist turned unemployable PR <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/fzYsMXdQl9w" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/fzYsMXdQl9w</a> JOSEPH GOEBBELS. I can also remember a Canadian (I think he was from Quebec) 15-years ago who routinely gained press coverage with false stories even though his name was well-known at the time.  I think he did some work for National PR’s Montreal office as a matter of fact.

Paddy Chayefsky’s insightful People’s Prophet Howard Beale has it right today as anyone who accesses The Internet can tell you, and Arthur Jensen expresses the current corporate cosmology of globalization just as many journalists, like Ms. Brzezinski, may have heard from their producers:


<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/5jmuhZY2mgs" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/5jmuhZY2mgs</a>            <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/trWcqxrQgcc" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/trWcqxrQgcc</a>     

Which brings us to The Internet and the cacaphony of voices who feel disenfranchised from the mainstream media though they live mainstream lives.  They weBlog in isolation, surrounded by people who mostly agree with them, while they enjoy the appearance of freeness of speech without much dissent – unless we talk about the scrutiny corporate Blogs receive, of course.  It’s the Great Circus. 

And inside that circus it has become harder to know The Truth.

Still our professionalism requires us to adhere to the highest standards of accuracy and truth in advancing the interests of those we represent and in communicating with the publicas spokesperson, ombudsperson or as counsellor to management.  And to do that is to respect the good advise of Ivy Lee Ledbetter: always tell the truth.  But we all know how his story turned out.

What are you, the big anonymous YOU that is voting in this poll, doing to adhere to the highest standards of accuracy and truth?  Is there a higher standard for your company than the standard the PRSA sets?

- R. A.

[Richard Whipple]

Just so Crow Communications does not come off as Holier than Thou, I will openly answer that as a small PR consultancy we cannot afford to do the kind of fact checking that we might otherwise do on a client so as to stringently adhere to the PRSA code and I doubt the larger firms do any better to be honest.  I would do better but the reality is I cannot - and you may not for the same reasons as well.  I am sure we would all practice great care in choosing a client given a choice.

My answer is that I fly by the seat of my pants with client truthfulness to "rely on word of mouth (informally ask around through contacts) about the client and extrapolate our judgment about the client truthfulness based on this educated guesswork investigation. No Client Access/Hearsay."

We do choose to represent clients who are practicing sustainability for the reason that they tend to be honest and "good guys." Economic sustainability can be (and is) verified via third parties like Dunn & Bradstreet etc., and I fly by the seat of my pants to investigate policies relating to environmental and social sustainability practices as well.  This translates into listening to the Buzz about the client/industry and having a rap session with each potential client to determine the vibe.

Remember, voting is anonymous.  I just wanted to let the Forum know that I am not below having high ideals or above the reality that faces many of us.  You need not tell any one your vote.


- R. A.

[Richard Whipple]

See, no votes tells me I am obsessed on the topic....   Oh well, maybe I am a bore at parties.   

So who is really telling the truth any more?  PRSA says the deterrent of losing our credibility with such communications channels as Dateline prevents public relations practitioners from lying to media.  After watching the actual news source credibility ratings drop with the American viewing public and reading stories similar to the one below, the PRSA reasoning does not have the ring of truth.  And The Internet is by far a harsher critic and far more cynical than I am about this.

Remember the scene in Network (between 3:00 - 5:33 minutes in the film clip below) between characters Diana Christensen of UBS Programming and Max Schumacher, News Director?
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/-qxV5FZhxZk" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/-qxV5FZhxZk</a> 
It was a sardonic take on television politics in 1976; sort of an inside joke for those of us involved in and around the media.  It seems chillingly prophetic these days.  We North Americans have enjoyed this film for 32 years so I include the clip for those from other countries who are not so familiar with what I am referring.  I wonder about the credibility of "the news" in other countries, as an aside.  In Poland, younger news anchors have more credibility presenting news than their older counterparts because of the stigma of Communism and Communist propaganda that masqueraded as news for years.  It is different in America, where the talk is about presenters being too young, but I wonder if this dynamic will change in the USA, and how The Internet will affect the mainstream news channels...? 

Anyway, I am getting off my own topic.  I want your votes here not to hear the sound of my own Blog.  Voting is about the question: if representing truth is an individual matter for professional public relations practitioners to police themselves, what does the aggregate consensus of individuals here show we, as a collective, are doing to adhere to that standard?   

Source: NBC settles suit over 'Dateline: Predator' episode
NEW YORK (AP) -- NBC Universal has settled a $105 million lawsuit brought by a woman who claimed a televised sex sting by "Dateline NBC: To Catch A Predator" drove her brother to kill himself.

"The matter has been amicably resolved to the satisfaction of both parties," said a statement released by both sides. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

Patricia Conradt's lawsuit had claimed her brother, a suburban Dallas prosecutor, fatally shot himself after he was accused of engaging in a sexually explicit online chat with an adult posing as a 13-year-old boy.

The lawsuit claimed NBC "steamrolled" authorities to arrest Louis William Conradt Jr. after telling police he failed to show up at a sting operation 35 miles away.

NBC was working with the activist group Perverted Justice on the sting, in which people impersonating children established online chats with men and tried to lure them to a house, where they were met by TV cameras and police.

In February, a federal judge issued a scathing ruling in the case, saying a jury might conclude the network "crossed the line from responsible journalism to irresponsible and reckless intrusion into law enforcement."

U.S. District Judge Denny Chin said the lawsuit contained sufficient facts to make it plausible that the suicide was foreseeable, that police had a duty to protect Conradt from killing himself and that the officers and NBC acted with deliberate indifference.

New episodes of "To Catch A Predator" ended in December, with the future of the series uncertain.

"Right now we are working on other investigative stories focusing on national security and the economy," NBC spokeswoman Jenny Tartikoff said Wednesday in an e-mail. "If we do more, we want to make sure we are complementing past investigations not just repeating them."

If you haven't seen the film Network, it is well worth the time.

- R. A.

[Sharon Bond]

Richard,

I didn't take the poll because at the moment I'm not running my own business, but I do have my own internal ethics code -- I don't want to work with clients whose products or philosophies could harm others. That means no tobacco companies, for sure; and during the time of the Exxon Valdez crisis, I do recall lively chats with my colleagues from Goodyear about who we would and wouldn't work for. I stridently stated I wouldn't work for Exxon, while one of my colleagues made the case that Exxon needed his services badly.

So, I think each PR practitioner has to make their own decisions about what is or isn't ethical. Does that mean it's a slippery slope? Possibly.

Sharon

[Richard Whipple]

Hi Sharon,

one of my colleagues made the case that Exxon needed his services badly.

I have read Exxon still has not paid their fine - twenty years later.  To say I am upset at this ongoing situation is an understatement, but I am a non-fan of Standard Oil from way back to the days of the American Liberty League, WWII and the injustice done to the idealistic PR crusader, Ivy Lee. 

For younger readers and those unfamiliar with our “American experience,” Exxon was responsible for the worst ecological disaster in history 20 years ago, killing wildlife all along the Alaska coastline.  Their public relations response was zero for I think 10 days. Eventually they had a press conference in New York City. Then, as word of the disaster slowly escaped back in the pre-Internet days and reporters flew themselves up to Alaska, they acknowledged the severity of the situation. They still had not sent clean up crews.

Fast-forward 20 years and I am angry at the ongoing “clean up” situation – just as a taxpayer not as a tree hugger. Okay, as a tree hugger I am also miffed but feelings do not matter in business because they’re not tied to money.  Problems tied to emotions get neither managed nor measured.  Ergo, the situation has not (will not be) changed.  Government and the judiciary are still “pwned” by big business like sharing a jail cell with the big hardened lifer with the salacious smile and twinkle in his eye.

Your colleague makes an idealistic point best left to the theory books, IMHO.  Ivy Lee’s employment with clients like IG Farben is a good example NOT to follow.  The rescuer/crusader, I can imagine your colleague to be the victim archetype in personal relationships.  It isn’t pretty, and it isn’t balanced.  The fact remains public relations is NOT strong enough to enter an evil company and provide the tipping point (nope, didn’t read it). 

And it is worth to note, neither was a real profession (accounting) able to do it in the case of Arthur Anderson versus Enron – though an Enron accountant was the whistle blower in a turn that makes former Enron PRs look like store mannequins. 

The company has to be good already, measuring the concepts of good and evil in a company against public utility and impact, rather than in vague terms like morality.  This directive is already part of the PRSA code, which as Jack O’Dwyer writes is worth less than flushed toilet paper (I paraphrase).

Fast-forward your colleague in a crusading relationship with Standard Oil (Exxon) and you fast-forward to a very bitter PR colleague – probably a compromised professional verisimilar to Scott McClellan writing a book. 

The rule of attraction states like tends to attract like.  I do not think the Director of Communications for Exxon will have worked at WWF, for example.  How does The Bible’s wisdom put it at 1Corinthians 15: 33 – Do not be misled.  Bad associations spoil useful habits. 

I don't want to work with clients whose products or philosophies could harm others. That means no tobacco companies

That off my chest, tobacco is a good example you cite.  The tobacco industry could use a strong dose of Al Ries’ focus management, whether he would agree with my particular interpretation of it or not.  Tobacco is a plant.  Cigarettes are a product from that plant.  I have no moral problem working for Tobacco per se.  I have a big problem working for cigarette manufacturers. The current industry management presents a huge barrier to my working for it because of its current business focus/obsession on the current product.  By not looking hard at alternatives to that product, Al might say they're not even following good management practice.

I seem to recall an article years ago, prior to all the health lawsuits (that will make someone else angry 20 years from now when they are not paid), about the benefits of the plant.  This was just before the big vitamin craze.  If I recall properly, one of the benefits written about was vitamin E or B. And, yes, probably the article originated from a tobacco company press release.

Imagine me as PR counsel, working for a tobacco company that’s buying food companies from other corporations because profits from the one and only tobacco product is in decline.  I will say this for cigarette manufacturers, they really gave our industry (PR) a boost as an appreciable everyday business function in promotion.  It made Kotler take notice and christen PR the 5th 'P' (insert vomit icon).

My job as PR counsel for a tobacco industry client, according to the PRSA code of ethics, is to advocate for the public welfare or resign.  Naturally I would advise my cigarette manufacturer client to re-tool their factories, re-train their worker and re-think their product along the lines of tobacco’s medical properties.

I would resign after I was laughed out of the office. (Rant deleted about PRSA offering me zero financial support for a principled decision and my professional colleagues lining up around the block to take my vacant post.)

Still the point is that PR can be practiced to reap great benefits for clients as a “two-way street” function - but only if the client, as the receiver, is open to the communications.  That means these clients have to be super-well managed and follow a vision - like Interface Carpet for example.

PR could have saved Enron; could have saved tobacco from the punitive litigation of the 1990s; could have saved General Motors; and that’s for starters. Other companies, like Starbuck’s Coffee could benefit too from increased relationships with the public.

But, as Jack wrote, public relations and PRSA, as the epicentre of the profession, have become stuck in a lawyering model of communications rather than evolve into a relating model. OK, mea culpa, that's a blanket statement.  Put another way: I never survived a personal relationship where I was always right.  Seems to be the antithesis of PR best practice to follow this model where client message trumps all, if anyone wants my opinion.

Plus, it's not sound stewardship.

- R. A.

[Sharon Bond]

Hi Richard,

Can't say as I disagree with any of your well-reasoned post, except for the part about working for a tobacco company -- being from North Carolina, I'm not aware of any benefits to the plant that I could "sell" to the general public. And I have actually worked in a tobacco field, for a relative of mine, and been to tobacco auctions and celebrations of everything tobacco as a newspaper reporter working in a tobacco town. But on the flip side, my mother, two aunts, my father-in-law and now my father, have suffered from lung cancer. So I could never shout its merits.

I did want to comment on one of the points you made:

>>PR could have saved Enron; could have saved tobacco from the punitive litigation of the 1990s; could have saved General Motors; and that’s for starters. Other companies, like Starbuck’s Coffee could benefit too from increased relationships with the public.<<

Totally agree. I think if PR/comms people had b***s, excuse my language, they could have more of an impact. I was brought into a company as a "change agent" back in the '90s, and I took that role seriously. It was an internal comms role, but I had the ear of the prez and his exec team. I played it absolutely straight with them, and don't regret it to th this day.

Through LinkedIn I've reconnected with some of the execs I used to work with, and I have to think they wouldn't link with me if they didn't respect me for taking what were sometimes unpopular stands.

I wish I could say I had that opportunity now, in my current position, but it's a totally different place and time.

Best,
Sharon

[Richard Whipple]

Hi Sharon,

I thought about you this morning while watching the CNN story about Bloomberg and Bill Gates taking on cigarette manufactures with a half-billion dollar commitment.

The role of public relations is thought by some to be sort of a one-way marketing communication function or it is perceived that public relations attracts people who are cocaine-fuelled, party-going, friendly back-slapping popular A-types. I have met male PRs who fit that mold, certainly.  But the mythology that PR people must be popular is very disconcerting because it is entirely false.  PR should not be relegated to the role of championing the most popular message, yet these very questions persist (within the PRSA I may add) as this question from LinkedIn admits.

Ironically, a PR professional can overcome addiction, outgrow parties and trade in lampshades for handshakes but when it comes to overcoming the idea that we go with the popular flow - which is a betrayal of our professional at-arms-distance code of ethics - the barrier seems unsurmountable.  Our role is often times precisely the opposite when representing/advocating opposing opinions: saying what is unpopular to be said typically in an environment of Group Think, requiring the presence of more character than cocaine in the advocate's system. Honest communications is our chief functional contribution at the policy-making table and it is at the heart of public relations being an independent profession.

I would like to read more comments from readers here about that idea: that we are independent professionals.

- R. A.