communication ethics Quotes

When I go stand up at the podium in front of the White House press corps, I never lie. I never say something that I know is untrue. Credibility is enormously important to a press secretary.

Be careful about gossiping because loose lips really do sink ships.

With true free speech has to come an understanding of when and when not to use it. But you can't legislate that. It must be voluntary - especially in a world where a whisper can reach a million people in an eye blink.

Just because you have a mouth and nobody is stopping you, you can't say whatever you want.

Words create conceptions and self-conceptions and ultimately nations. They can start and stop wars. They can would and heal. Choosing words carefully is a moral responsibility.

Communications requires study, preparation, and a special attention to truth, goodness and beauty.

A system of limitless individual choices, with respect to communications, is not necessarily in the interest of citizenship and self-government.

The greatest test of a man's character is his tongue.

I have always thought that clarity is a form of courtesy that the philosopher owes; moreover, this discipline of ours considers it more truly a matter of honor today than ever before to be open to all minds ... This is different from the individual sciences which increasingly [interpose] between the treasure of their discoveries and the curiosity of the profane the tremendous dragon of their closed terminology.

Beware of the anger of the mouth. Master your words. Let them serve truth.

Never answer anonymous letters.

I've learned that my word carries weight, and that's something I have to always have to keep in mind.

When you have a platform and people listen, it's very important what you chose to say.

If there is ever an amelioration of the condition of mankind, philosophers, theologians, legislators, politicians and moralists will find that the regulation of the press is the most difficult, dangerous and important problem they have to resolve. Mankind cannot now be governed without it, nor at present with it.

Television should be the last mass communication medium to be naively designed and put into the world without a surgeon-general's warning.

The press is the foe of rhetoric, but the friend of reason.

Incoherence is a common hazard for journalists who dabble in ethical judgments.

The expansive anarchy of the Internet continues to lull us into believing that, because we can see something, that something should be seen. Because we can say something, there is something that must be said.