Opinion: Pros and cons in stampede reports

Media does its duty

To Fudan students:

It's always easy to accuse others of occupying the moral high ground, because that saves us the trouble of trying to resolve issues. In this age of the Internet, everyone can choose to make public part or all of his/her information, which is not considered private.

We have access to all kinds of social networks, and the information they contain may be used by all, including the media. Besides, our social activities inevitably involve exchange of information.

In the stampede case, journalists quoted information on one of the female victims that were openly available on the Internet. Journalists also interviewed the victim's family and classmates.

No one has ever hacked her e-mail account or tapped her friends' telephones. So, how did journalists violate privacy?

Still, people have the right to protect their information from being made public.

Besides the open letter, some online posts signed by Fudan University students said that the media should not interview her family (and that her family should not give interviews to the media).

Do not demonize journalists. If her family members want the victim to be remembered as a live person instead of a cold number, they have the right to talk to the media and narrate their part of the story, but her schoolmates have no right to say what the media "should" or "should not" do.

One thing is certain: the whole process has nothing to do with Fudan students, who claim to be overtly concerned about her parents and other family members, but who have never inquired about their opinions. Please do not act like a bureaucrat before you become one.

From an anonymous reporter