Trial by media
Journalistic ethics should rest on essential values: truth, rigour, integrity, responsibility and the presumption of innocence…
Yet some seem to allow themselves to go astray, launching veritable media fatwas to protect someone close to them, defend an ideology or settle personal scores.
We are witnessing a process of public destruction in which the accusation rests on rumours, covered by the famous “witness protection”. Behind these waves there is often a ringleader who only comes out of the shadows once justice has been done.
The human damage
Being in the public eye means accepting criticism. But this is no longer criticism; it is relentless persecution. In Belgium, the Maison des Lanceurs d’Alerte founded by Claude Archer (Transparencia) exists to protect those who blow the whistle. Yet paradoxically, the press seems to grant itself the right to accuse without restraint or fear of the consequences.
Personalities targeted
Stéphane Pauwels: an unconventional presenter who shook up the world of football and the media, he faced relentless judicial and professional persecution. Although he won against RTL, he gave up the appeal to protect his family. One of the channel’s former bosses pursued him relentlessly.
Marc Filipson: head of the Librairie Filigranes, he suffered a largely exaggerated media tsunami on shaky grounds. Today the bookshop has changed hands, and he himself is focusing on his loved ones. Clearly, it is a cultural journalist from a local Brussels television channel who is the leader of the revolt.
Rudy Léonet: at the RTBF, he faced salvoes of criticism, amplified by long‑standing personal quarrels for which he paid the price. The taxi driver Hep Taxi has been in conflict with Rudy for years.
Carl De Rijck (alias Carl de Moncharline): recently convicted for private matters, he was the target of a ferocious media campaign, notably via the programme “Investigation”, virulently relayed on social media. The Belgian PPDA went wild on social media. The mask has fallen.
These cases concern human beings, not just names in the news. Behind every attack there are loved ones, children, lives made fragile. Why is so much media energy devoted to bringing down individuals, when a genuine counter‑power remains to be exercised against the political and financial spheres?
The people targeted remain my friends. And what shocks me is not the criticism, but media harassment under the guise of professional ethics.
The real indecency
Those who run our world remain unpunished. They wall themselves up in silence like Didjé National, play for time or arm themselves with a forest of lawyers paid for by our taxes, ultimately to reach the accessible star of the unreasonable delay in a justice system mired in its own scaffolding.
Our democratic right is flouted in an uncontrollable legal machine that benefits only the dishonest, as in the Baldan vs von der Leyen case. The defence takes cover behind procedural forms, but the substance is never reached.
Yet it is in the substance that one recognises one’s… enemies.
Pietje Schramouille
The opinions expressed in this op-ed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of BAM!
