Journalism ethics.

To many the phrase is an oxymoron. To journalists it is an everlasting, puzzling problem.

Paul McMasters, First Amendment ombudsman and former president of the Society of Professional Journalists, spoke to several classes in the journalism department Monday including Richard Haws’ ethics class.

“Not a day goes by that the press’s ethics aren’t called into question by the readers and viewers,” he said.

“It’s not because we don’t care about ethics or don’t discuss them. So why are our ethics questioned so often?”

He said the media often has difficulty explaining journalism ethics to the public. “Rather than just explain it to them, we just avoid it.”

He compared journalism with other professional occupations, such as the CIA, city police forces and advertising. He said many people would consider the press to have worse ethics than those institutions, although the CIA has been accused of selling guns and drugs.

Television shows violence because violence gets ratings, he said. Therefore, many TV news programs cover violence under the theme: “If it bleeds, it leads,” and journalism standards are compromised in the wake of entertainment value.

“Many of us who make decisions about what goes into the newspapers and news broadcasts don’t show what the people say they want. They put what they know they want — the sleaze.”

People who don’t read newspapers, McMasters said, worry him. He said that as citizens in a democracy people should read newspapers.

Many people, he said, who complain about what is in the paper change their minds about the process of news gathering once they’ve seen it.

“I have seen people reverse their opinions of the paper by sitting in on one of those news budget meetings,” he said.

He said, “We don’t explain ourselves, clarify or apologize, yet we don’t understand why people don’t understand us.”