The First Amendment Bubble: How Privacy and Paparazzi Threaten a Free Press

by Amy Gajda

Overview

In determining the news that’s fit to print, U.S. courts have traditionally declined to second-guess professional journalists. But in an age when news, entertainment, and new media outlets are constantly pushing the envelope of acceptable content, the consensus over press freedoms is eroding. The First Amendment Bubble examines how unbridled media are endangering the constitutional privileges journalists gained in the past century.

For decades, judges have generally affirmed that individual privacy takes a back seat to the public’s right to know. But the growth of the Internet and the resulting market pressures on traditional journalism have made it ever harder to distinguish public from private, news from titillation, journalists from provocateurs. Is a television program that outs criminals or a website that posts salacious videos entitled to First Amendment protections based on newsworthiness? U.S. courts are increasingly inclined to answer no, demonstrating new resolve in protecting individuals from invasive media scrutiny and enforcing their own sense of the proper boundaries of news.

This judicial backlash now extends beyond ethically dubious purveyors of infotainment, to mainstream journalists, who are seeing their ability to investigate crime and corruption curtailed. Yet many—heedless of judicial demands for accountability—continue to push for ever broader constitutional privileges. In so doing, Amy Gajda warns, they may be creating a First Amendment bubble that will rupture in the courts, with disastrous consequences for conventional news.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674368323
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	01/05/2015
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 9.40(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Amy Gajda, a former journalist, is Associate Professor of Law at Tulane University.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

1 An Introduction 1

2 Legal Protections for News and Truthful Information: The Past 24

3 Legal Protections for News and Truthful Information: The Present 50

4 The Devolution of Mainstream Journalism 88

5 The Rise, and Lows, of Quasi-Journalism 122

6 The New Old Legal Call for Privacy 156

7 The First Amendment Bubble, Absolutism, and Hazardous Growth 191

8 Drawing Difficult Lines 222

Notes 263

Acknowledgments 293

Index 295

Editorial Reviews

What can be done to save journalism from growing legal pushbacks and the rise of privacy that threatens First Amendment safeguards? Amy Gajda has written an incredibly timely and detailed book, packed with compelling examples.

Clay Calvert

The difficult question—as always in First Amendment and most constitutional litigation—is where to draw the line. In grappling with that and offering provisional answers…Gajda do[es] a great service.

Chronicle of Higher Education - Erwin Chemerinsky

Provocative and well-researched… Gajda’s book serves as a warning that courts may be losing patience with repeated appeals from media organizations—which may or may not properly be considered journalistic—claiming that their right to broadcast increasingly intrusive and personal material is of newsworthiness, and in the public interest. Her argument is that these profit-driven, sensationalistic efforts to push the limits of the First Amendment will wind up spoiling press freedoms for the professional mainstream press, by setting court precedents that chip away at First Amendment rights for everyone… It’s a timely intervention, and Gajda carries it off convincingly.

PopMatters - Hans Rollman

The First Amendment Bubble raises very important questions about the future of journalism and concerns that judicial responses to irresponsible reporting could harm our democratic society. The author’s experience as a journalist shines through in this well-researched and engaging book.

Angela Campbell

12/01/2014
Former journalist Gajda's (law, Tulane Univ.; The Trials of Academe) timely book addresses threats to freedom of the press in the age of blogging and digital news sources. Chapter 1 examines the courts' relationship with the press at the turn of the 20th century through the 1960s and 1970s. Succeeding chapters examine the rise of the Internet and its impact on traditional media. As alternative media sources have increased financial pressures on media companies and the definition of journalism and the concept of privacy have become looser, the public has become more wary of the press and the courts have also begun to treat the media with more scrutiny. Gajda argues that the press should take responsibility for its ethics, while courts must safeguard free speech. Each section uses recent court cases and anecdotes to explore the balance between free speech and privacy and the importance of each of these rights. VERDICT Journalism students and those who study digital media will be most drawn to this book that tackles a complex subject in a compelling way.—Becky Kennedy, Atlanta-Fulton P.L.

Library Journal

2014-11-06
A lawyerly look at what threatens journalistic free speech liberties. As a former journalist, Gajda (Law/Tulane Univ.; The Trials of Academe: The New Era of Campus Litigation, 2009) critiques and advises on matters of privacy and free speech with a keen journalistic eye. She explores the ways public scrutiny by news media (while protected under the guise of "newsworthiness") tarnishes the notion of public privacy. As First Amendment constitutional protections for the press continue to expand, the "balance between privacy rights and public interests" becomes increasingly skewed. The author cites the current wave of ubiquitous social media, where personal information is willingly and willfully disseminated, as a prime instigator fueling the privacy rights debate. But at what point do First Amendment rights trump personal privacy rights? Her thoughtful discussion includes chapters juxtaposing journalism's former golden age with the lax media standards of today's paparazzi and shock reporters, where "push-the-envelope behavior has elevated privacy concerns to new levels." Writing in concise, authoritative language, Gajda reiterates the significance of free speech, freedom of the press and the preservation of personal liberties within a complex debate that has become frustratingly blurred by legal ambiguities and loopholes. Fully utilizing (if overly reliant upon) pivotal court cases, she also highlights ruthless vigilante programs like To Catch a Predator and stories of misbehaving celebrities who have been scrutinized for wrongdoings by exploitative websites infamous for straddling ethical boundaries. Ultimately, Gajda writes, this is subject matter that will fester for decades as digital and social media erode the protective facade of personal privacy and evaporate the guidelines of what is considered newsworthy. She concludes with an appeal for change in how the law appropriates the First Amendment framework in both the private sector and within news media circles. An eye-opening, relevant and cautionary book.

Kirkus Reviews