You know, I wonder where Superman changes nowadays.
There haven't been proper phone booths on random street corners for years, and it's not like he's gonna fit in a cell phone!
Are there just some carefully removed scenes from each Superman movie now where he's just letting little Kal-el fly?
Hello Internet!
Welcome to Film Theory, where we strive to be the Internet's most ETHICAL fictional conspiracy theory show.
So, there's a lot of Spider-Man stuff happening right now.
There's the new Spider-Man PS4 game, Into the Spider-Verse later this year,
and as such, I've been rewatching the old Sam Raimi Spider-Man movies to search for theory fodder.
And you know what caught my attention looking through all that?
J. Jonah Jameson, one of the single best characters in all of comic fiction!
Not only is he hilarious in those movies...
Peter Parker: "Spiderman wasn't attacking the city. He was trying to save it. That's slander."
Jameson: "It is not. I resent that.
Slander is spoken. In print, it's libel."
What really struck me this time was his commitment to his journalistic integrity.
Green Goblin flies through the window and practically sets all of J.J.'s offices on fire,
clutching him by the throat, and DEMANDING that he tell him who takes Spidey's pictures for The Bugle.
Peter Parker is LITERALLY right there outside his office, the two of them just having gotten into a fight!
And what does J. Jonah do?
Green Goblin: "Who's the photographer who takes the pictures of Spider-man?!"
JJ: "I don't know who he is! His stuff comes in the mail!"
GG: "You're lying!"
He lies to Green Goblin's face!
For as harsh as he can be, he protects the anonymity of his sources and his employees WITH HIS OWN LIFE.
It's truly the mark of a heroic journalist.
All of this got me thinking about other superhero reporters, specifically the most famous one of them all:
Superman. When Superman puts on those magic glasses he becomes mild-mannered Clark Kent, star reporter for The Daily Planet.
Well, maybe STAR reporter is overselling his role a bit.
Perry: "I logged into your Dropbox to find a copy.
There's a copy, all right!
Nothing about football. Nothing about ...
Friends of the Metropolis Library."
Throughout Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice, we start seeing the inner workings of The Daily Planet,
and, well, the way they treat the news is a bit...concerning.
Clark: "When the Planet was founded, it stood for something, Perry."
Perry: "So could you if it was 1938, but it's not 1938.
Nobody cares about Clark Kent taking on the Batman."
Well, they did care about it until they saw this movie. Ha-haaaa!
Self-awareness for the win.
But seriously. With behavior like that, would the Daily Planet be considered a good ethical newspaper?
Or is it just a whole lot more fake news?
I mean Perry White is no J. Jonah Jameson and usually that's seen in a good way, but is it really?
So today, I'm taking a deep dive into the icy pool of superhero journalism
in an effort to determine whether Superman, the icon of truth, justice, and the American way,
is working for a company that's just as sleazy as the criminals he's working to put behind bars.
Now, obviously I can't go accusing one of the most iconic fictional papers of being unethical without setting up a few rules first.
So I turned to the experts.
The Society of Professional Journalists, in their mission to protect and improve journalism,
has created some very clear guidelines for journalistic ethics.
The rules fall into one of four main categories:
"Seek the truth and report it,"
"Minimize harm,"
"Act independently,"
and "Be accountable and transparent."
Now the first one almost seems obvious.
As a newspaper, the Planet should be interested in seeking out the truth and reporting it.
You know, delivering the news in an objective fashion.
But when you actually look at how it operates, they really fail in some SPECTACULAR ways.
As part of this category, the Society of Professional Journalists lists:
1: Being vigilant and courageous about holding those with power accountable; giving a voice to the voiceless.
2: Boldly telling the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience.
Seek sources whose voices we seldom hear.
And 3: Avoiding stereotypes.
Journalists should be examining the ways their values and experiences may shape their reporting.
All of which are great goals.
Representing everyone fairly and equally, giving a spotlight to the stories that have no other outlets.
So let's see how Perry White and the Daily Planet feel about all that.
In the 1978 Superman, the iconic and widely considered best film version of Superman, Lois Lane comes in with a pitch for her story.
Lois: "It's got everything. It's got sex, it's got violence, it's got the 'ethnic' angle."
Ah... the ethnic angle.
*Matpat laughs* Oh boy...
Okay, let's give Lois the benefit of the doubt and assume that she's trying to, I don't know, "give voice to the voiceless."
So how does her editor-in-chief Perry White respond?
Perry: "So does a lady wrestler with a foreign accent"
Oof! "A lady wrestler with a foreign accent?"
Looks like Perry missed the day where they taught point number three about avoiding stereotypes.
It truly does sound like Perry is sacrificing his ethical integrity because the story is merely about minorities.
Any way you slice it, is clearly not a response that gives us any sort of confidence that he's examining
ways that his values and experiences may be shaping the reporting.
But that was way back in the 1970s.
Surely the modern Perry White has been sufficiently woke, right?
Clark: "Why aren't we covering this? Poor people don't buy papers?"
Perry: "People don't buy papers period, Kent."
Clark: "Perry, when you assign a story you're making a choice about who matters."
Perry: "Good morning, Smallville.
The American conscience died."
And the problems don't just exist in the stories that Perry is selecting,
but also how he's encouraging those stories to be framed.
Another tenant of the Society is to, quote, "Provide context.
Take special care not to misrepresent or oversimplify in promoting previewing or summarizing a story."
And, uh, what's the thing that we hear repeatedly throughout the original Superman film?
Perry White's official motto that he teaches all his reporters?
"A good reporter doesn't get great stories, Jimmy." "A good reporter makes them great."
Regardless of whether you're stuck with a slogan slinging '70s stereotyping Perry White,
or the modern DCEU's random story assigning Perry White,
working at the Planet has always seemed to be an ethical minefield.
Now, you're probably thinking that Perry in both of these cases is just trying to do what's best for the Daily Planet:
Making money and selling more copies.
But that is EXACTLY why this code of ethics exists in the first place.
To show reporters where the line exists between a good story and being a good journalist.
Point number two: "Minimize harm."
So this sounds like it should be a really simple task for a newspaper that unwittingly employs a superhero.
But this principle is actually based on the need to balance the public's need for information
against the potential harm or discomfort that information getting out could cause them.
It basically boils down to whether the public knowing a certain piece of information is going to be better or worse for them,
and also whether revealing that information is harmful to the private citizen it belongs to.
Throughout Batman V Superman, we witness Perry White repeatedly shutting down Clark's attempts at an exposé on Batman,
a man who is, for all intents and purposes, an out-of-control vigilante.
I don't know about you, but it certainly seems like a piece of information that would be pertinent to the safety of the public, but nope!
Apparently according to Perry, it needs to stay under wraps.
Perry: "Nothing about football. Just...
The got-damn Gotham Bat thing I told you not to pursue."
Clark: "The police won't help. The press has to do the right thing."
Perry: "You don't get to decide what the right thing is."
But it's even worse in Man of Steel when Lois decides to bury her story on the existence and identity of Superman.
You know, the first ever confirmed actual super-powered alien to ever land on earth ever!
Perry: "I believe you saw something, Lois.
So whatever your reasons are for dropping it, I think you're doing the right thing.
Can you imagine how people on this planet would react if they knew there was someone like this out there?"
Sure, it seems like Perry, for once, is taking his responsibility to his readers seriously.
But I would argue that he's making the wrong decision here.
As we see later in the movie, the public would soon find out about Superman's existence through his very public battle against Zod.
A battle that causes panic, fear, and EXTREME loss of life.
An introduction to Superman as a peaceful entity through Lois Lane's Daily Planet article prior to that battle
would have gone a long way to mitigate the questions the public would have had in the aftermath of that battle,
circumventing not only a large part of the general outcry and overall atmosphere of fear present in Batman V Superman,
but also, well, it would just circumvent a lot of that movie in general.
Which is not a bad thing.
But really those two categories are nothing compared to the massive ethical violations in the "Act independently" and "Be accountable and transparent" sections.
When it comes to acting independently, of the five rules listed on the Society's website,
The Daily Planet breaks the following four:
One: Avoiding conflicts of interest, real or perceived; disclosing unavoidable conflicts.
Two: Refusing gifts, favors, fees, free travel, and special treatment;
and avoiding political and other outside activities that may compromise integrity or impartiality, or may just damage credibility.
Three: Being wary of sources offering information for favors or money; not paying for access to news;
identifying content provided by outside sources, whether paid or not.
And finally, point number four: denying favored treatment to advertisers, donors, or other special interests;
and resisting internal and external pressure to influence coverage.
And most of these ethical standards are put through the shredder by Perry White assigning Clark
what seems to be yet another seemingly random story in the middle of Batman V Superman:
Perry: "Benefit for the Library of Metropolis.
Someone on the committee requested that Clark Kent cover it.
Probably some old charity crone who's got a thing for nerds."
Whoa! Slow down your violations there Perry.
You just assigned your sports reporter--
Perry: "You're sports today."
--to cover a charity benefit just because someone rich asked you to?
That seems like a very direct violation of "Denying favored treatment to advertisers and donors."
But it's even worse in the 1978 Superman movie
where Perry White is literally willing to give away ownership over the company to Superman
just so he can get some exclusive coverage.
Clark: "I don't think that he would, uh, lend himself to any cheap promotion schemes though, Mr. White."
Perry: "Exactly how would you know that?"
Clark: "Just a...first impression?"
Perry: "Well anyway, who's talking cheap? I'll make him a partner if I have to!"
So yeah. The Daily Planet breaks about every ethical rule in the book:
Biased coverage, preferential treatment to donors,
hyperbolic empty-headed clickbait titles, and willfully withholding information pertinent to the public good.
But if that wasn't bad enough, here's the worst part:
They've dragged down Superman with them.
Clark himself isn't innocent in any of this.
After all, any story that Clark writes about Batman, or any superhero, or any supervillain for that matter,
is unquestionably biased and a direct conflict of interest, since Clark is Superman.
Such undisclosed information could radically alter the public's perception of any story that he writes,
given that he's the one out there punching it up on the streets.
I mean, Bruce Wayne even acknowledges this in Batman V Superman:
Bruce: "The Daily Planet criticizing those who think they're above the laws... It's a little hypocritical,
considering every time your hero saves a cat out of a tree, you write a puff-piece editorial about an alien."
Clark makes things worse for Lois Lane, too.
Providing her with gifts, favors, fees, free travel, and special treatment,
all of which could radically alter her bias and stories about not just Superman, but also all of Superman's enemies.
In Superman Returns, true to the title of the movie, Superman leaves, and then he returns.
It's actually a very accurate title. But in the interim while he's gone, Lois's connection with the Man of Steel
and her frustration with her romantic partner up and leaving without any notice
causes her to write an article titled "Why the World Doesn't Need Superman,"
an article which wins her a Pulitzer Prize!
You think that would have been written had she not been all lovey dovey with the boy in blue?
Certainly not!
You think that the Pulitzer Prize judges would have given her an award for journalism had they known that she was shtupping Supes?
Definitely not!
Every time that Clark puts his fingers on a keyboard,
he is lying to the American people about his process, about what he knows, and about what he's thinking.
He weaves tales; careful to conceal his identity and his biases, leaving the people of Metropolis in the dark.
And here's the kicker: He knows it. That's why he's working at the Daily Planet in the first place.
Clark: "I gotta find a job where I can keep my ear to the ground. Where people won't look twice...
when I want to go somewhere dangerous,
and start asking questions."
It is done with intention. He has no plans to accurately report the news.
He's using the guise of a reporter to protect himself.
Sorry, remind me what Superman stands for again?
Superman: "I'm here to fight for truth, and justice, and the American way."
Yeah, I'll give you two out of the three.
Let's just leave the truth one off the list.
But hey!
That's just a theory!
A Film Theory!
Aaaaaand
Do you know what's wrong with Superman? He's never taken a class in journalism.
Maybe he would have learned better journalistic ethics if he'd actually bothered to study up on his chosen profession.
You know, what would have made him a better reporter? Our partner for today's episode: Skillshare.
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That's right, Supes! That sticky bit about truth again. Preach it, Skillshare!
Sure, they support Film Theory so we can keep sowing seeds of doubt into your mind about all your favourite fictional heroes,
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Now if you'll excuse me, I have to follow up with my choux pastry making class.
Great British Bake Off, here I come!