The media might be overstepping their bounds on privacy issues in the lives of both public and private figures, Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis said Thursday in a keynote address at a Northwestern symposium on free speech.
“The subject of privacy is important in contemporary society,” Lewis said, “but is easily overridden in the rush for gossip and entertainment.”
Lewis spoke in favor of the right “to be let alone,” arguing for the individual’s right to privacy. Lewis’ speech at Scott Hall kicked off a two-day symposium called “Privacy in the System of Free Expression,” which continues today at the Transportation Center.
The symposium, hosted by the Medill School of Journalism, the School of Law and the School of Speech, will feature prominent journalism and law professors speaking about the role of the media concerning issues of privacy and the First Amendment.
Lewis took a strong stance on these issues, saying: “I believe with all my heart in the First Amendment, but privacy is essential for all of us as individuals and as a society.”
He attributed the increasing erosion of privacy to invasive technology and to the competitiveness of the communications industry.
Using Internet technology, one can access all types of information, including bank accounts and unlisted phone numbers, Lewis said. Using the Lewinsky scandal as an example, Lewis discussed the violations of Lewinsky’s privacy by Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr, who discovered love letters to the president on Lewinsky’s computer.
“I don’t think it was any of our business,” Lewis said of the Clinton-Lewinsky relationship.
Public figures’ right to privacy has changed greatly over time, he said.
When Franklin Roosevelt was president, the press hid the fact that he was in a wheelchair rather than exposing it, Lewis said.
“Nowadays it is hard to imagine any revelation the press feels is too intimate to publish,” he said.
Lewis also emphasized the privacy rights of ordinary citizens. He condemned instances of reporters and photographers accompanying police officers “bursting into private homes.”
In a brief question-and-answer period that followed his speech, Lewis received both criticism and praise from his audience, which consisted of NU administrators, faculty and students, along with the other symposium speakers.
One woman questioned whether there was a link between the media’s invasion of privacy and people’s increasing willingness to reveal details of their own lives on daytime talk shows such as the Jerry Springer Show or the Oprah Winfrey Show.
“Society has become more given to exposure,” Lewis said, “but there is a difference between willingly exposing yourself and the press imposing itself.”
Speaker Freimut Duve, a former German politician and journalist, asked Lewis how he would propose organizing the field of journalism to make it more responsible.
“We can’t,” Lewis replied. “All you can do is occasionally make a meaningless speech like mine, saying, ‘Behave better.’ That is all you can do.”
