The Media Needs Regulation

The Media Needs Regulation

The death of Princess Diana on August 31, 1997 shocked the world; her death was

considered the biggest tragedy of the year, and the media responded accordingly.

Her death prompted the media into a frenzy to sanctify her memory; however,

through the documentaries and commemorative magazines, the media proved their

guilt of invasion of Princess Diana's privacy by displaying the immense amount

of information they gathered throughout her life. In fact, a week before she

died, she vacationed in Greece with writer friend Rosa Monckton, and they tried

to outsmart the paparazzi for simple privacy. Diana said to Monckton, "It's a

hunt, Rosa. It's a hunt. Will you really tell people what it is like?" The

article expressing to people the paparazzi's hunt lay half-written on a desk

when Monckton learned her friend died being "hunted to her death" (108-109).

This opened my eyes to the fact that the media needs limitations. The media

should refrain from intruding into the personal lives of people, and in the

United States the problem is evident throughout media history. Proper actions

can be taken in the United States to hinder invasion of privacy by the media

without reducing the power of the first amendment. If the United States adopted

an organization similar to Great Britain's Press Complaints Commission which

self-regulates their media, it would be a great start for protecting people's

right of privacy from the media in the United States.

The media in the United States did not begin by reporting the private lives of

people in the news or people in the public eye. The 1960's i...

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