You should know what it says or have it to hand. If media ethics continues to lead a shadowy existence in many journalism school curricula and journalism degree programs and is sometimes not very present in editorial offices and, quite obviously, in media management, uncertainty grows. the dispute over reporting after the events in middle east rcs data Cologne, which the media in particular could have easily settled: by weighing up their reporting in a more differentiated manner and explaining this to their audience in a transparent manner based on the code. In short: the reporting after New Year's Eve in Cologne revealed gaps in ethical competence.
Specifically, it was about the assumption that the perpetrators of the sexual assault were of North African descent. The aforementioned guideline 12.1 in the German code recommends restraint, because the crime, in this case the sexual assault, is not necessarily linked to a particular religion or origin, for example.
At the moment, however, many people of different religions and ethnicities are coming to Germany as refugees. This increases fears, but also attributions that confirm clichés. Because of this current mood, I would have found it better if, in the case of Cologne, another guideline of the press code, "truthful information of the public" (Guideline 1), had been given priority over the guideline on discrimination in many reports.