Reflections From a Murky Pond

Perhaps it’s just me and the odd way my mind works, but the dichotomy in both legal and societal reaction to blackmail and “investigative journalism” seems quite odd to me. The difference between how we as a society view the two enterprises doesn’t seem to have any real, fact-based reasoning.

Why is Blackmail a crime, a felony in most or all cases, and “investigative journalism,” which is often better described as “muckraking” and does greater perceived harm to the victim an oft-lauded and protected activity?

The Shamed – Might They Have Preferred Blackmail?

Both blackmail and “investigative journalism” are based upon finding damaging and/or embarrassing details about a victim. The only difference is that a blackmailer gives the victim an alternative to being exposed.

So why is the blackmailer vilified and the reporter oft-times lauded?

It can’t be because blackmail causes greater harm to the victim than the muckraker does. Simple economics require that the price asked of the the victim by the blackmailer be less painful than exposure would be. Blackmail, after all, is a consumer driven industry where the victim sets the price based upon his or perceived pain points.

It can’t be because the blackmailer profits from his activities. Journalists, paparazzi, and random individuals with access to “sensitive” information regularly profit from exposing influential or famous people’s various faults, flaws, failings, and peccadilloes.

Nor can I see where or how it could be that blackmail is a crime against the People or State as opposed to being a crime against a Person. Not all, or even most cases of blackmail have involved politicians or businessmen in the context of their jobs and few of those that we know of have involved extorting them to act in certain manners. In point of fact, the exposées much touted by the media have seemingly had far more impact upon corporations and politics, yet they are legal and societally approved of.

It just doesn’t some to make any logical sense, yet I and all who I know are firm in our convictions that blackmail is wrong and must be a crime, whereas “investigative journalism” – or even “tell all,” unapproved biographies – are to be protected as basic rights necessary to our society.

Tags: Blackmail | Crime | Irony | Journalism | Law | Media | Musings | Politics | Shame | Society | WTF

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 11th, 2011 at 8:54 am and is filed under Musings, Politics, Society. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

Indonesia is demanding to be paid $5-$20 USD per hectare not to destroy its remaining forests, for the first time giving an monetary figure that they want extort from the world’s wealthier and more environmental conscious countries. Indonesia wants “big emitters” such as the United States and the European Union to pay the country to preserve its pristine rainforests.

We will ask for a compensation of $5-20 per hectare. It’s not fixed; it is open to negotiation

— Rachmat Witoelar
Indonesian Environment Minister

With a total forested area of 91 million ha (225 million acres), Indonesia could receive as much as $US1.8 billion in blackmail (greenmail?) for preserving its forests under the proposal. Indonesia will also attempt to extort a fixed price for other forms of biodiversity, including coral reefs.

So far we have not received anything for what we have done Now that there is a price tag for preservation, the amount of money we get will increase multifold.

— Rachmat Witoelar

Asking the “big emitters” to agree to the environmental extortion is made even more intolerable by the fact that Indonesia is one of the world’s top three carbon emitters according to a report sponsored by the World Bank and Britain’s development arm.

Tags: Blackmail | Extortion | Green | Greenmail | Indonesia | The Environment

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 10th, 2007 at 3:02 pm and is filed under The Environment. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.