职责、真相与特权

宋云峰

2015年在多伦多国际电影节上映的政治题材纪录剧情片（docudrama）《真相》（Truth， dir. James Vanderbilt）系根据美国著名记者和电视新闻节目制片人玛丽·梅普思（Mary Mapes）自传回忆录《真相与职责：媒体、总统和特权》（Truth and Duty： the Press， the President and the Privilege of Power）改编的纪实性剧情片。影片因涉及当年CBS（哥伦比亚电视公司）新闻节目《60分钟》对小布什总统70年代服兵役期间享受特权的报道，引起关于所据文件真伪的轩然大波，再度引发各方争议，使人深思美国媒体（出版）自由、媒体（人）揭弊职责与特权阶层关系的问题。

1. 美国的言论自由与出版自由及其限度

在推翻了英国殖民统治并获得独立之后，针对个人作为弱者的自由权利可能受到国家政府的限制甚至剥夺，美国宪法第一修正案对个人的具体自由权利进行了详细规定，主要是宗教信仰、言论出版、集会请愿等三大自由，特别以禁止国会就此立法的形式详列宪法修正案之首。

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion， or prohibiting the free exercise thereof； or abridging（删减）the freedom of speech， or of the press； or the right of the people peaceably to assemble， and to petition（请愿）the Government for a redress（平反）of grievances（不满，申诉）.”

与此类似，联合国于1948年发布的《人权宣言》（Universal Declaration of Human Rights）也对言论和表达自由权做了相应的规定：

“Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression； this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference， and impart（告知）information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers（国境）.”

尽管此类自由权被英美视为当然的权利，政府也无权对这些自由进行干涉，但是所谓自由总是和限制如影随形，正如权利与义务是同一枚硬币的两面。在英美国家，媒体行业对记者与编辑的新闻报道和意见表达均有职业道德的详细行规，比如在阶级、种族和性别问题上的政治正确，报道必须客观公正并有据可依。英国以及美国各州也有涉及诽谤的法律规定。此外，英美政府有权禁止媒体获取涉及国家利益（national interest）的政府部门相关的信息或文件，至于哪些信息涉及国家利益则由政府有关部门做出具体规定。违反这些规定，例如报道不实或者涉及诽谤抑或涉嫌披露国家机密，有关记者和媒体或者在业界名誉扫地，或者其所在媒体单位遭到起诉并付出巨额赔偿。所以尽管英美的主流媒体（美国大部分电视网和报纸、英国所有的报纸和除BBC以外的所有电视台）均为私有的和商业化的，记者和主播也以赚钱出名为主要目的，但是涉及揭弊（尤其是对特权阶层和名人），媒体则格外小心，确保证据确凿，否则会吃不了兜着走，自毁声誉。

Defamation（中伤，诽谤）is the communication of a false statement that harms the reputation of an individual person， business， product， group， government， religion， or nation. Some common law（英美的習惯法，不成文法）jurisdictions（司法）also distinguish between spoken defamation， called slander， and defamation in other media such as printed words or images， called libel.

With respect to governmental information， any government may distinguish which materials are public or protected from disclosure（披露）to the public based on classification（分类）of information as sensitive， classified（机密的）or secret and being otherwise protected from disclosure due to relevance of the information to protecting the national interest.

2. CBS《60分钟》新闻访谈与“吉利安文件争议”（拉瑟门事件）

吉利安文件争议（The Killian documents controversy）亦称“拉瑟门”事件（Rathergate），涉及已故上级军官杰里·吉利安（Jerry B. Killian）对美国总统小布什1972—1973年在空中国民警卫队（Air National Guard）服役期间表现的六份批评文件。在追踪报道小布什70年代逃避服兵役（当时越南战争尚未结束，小布什利用得克萨斯州高官的关系进入空中国民警卫队，从而避免了被征兵去越南打仗）所引发的争议时，CBS新闻节目制片人玛丽·梅普思从得克萨斯陆军国民警卫队（Texas Army National Guard）前军官比尔·布凯特（Bill Burkett）手里得到其中四份文件的复印件，并在距2004年美国总统大选投票（小布什与克里之间角逐）不到两个月时，由CBS《60分钟》新闻访谈节目著名主持人丹·拉瑟（Dan Rather）将其公布，声称CBS聘请的专家已认定这些文件的真实性。

然而，这一论断随后受到了来自互联网论坛和一些博客的质疑，主要涉及文件的个别字体和版式与当年所使用的打字机不符，更有可能是在90年代之后出现的电脑排版（Microsoft Word）制作的。此外，该文件提供者布凯特声称，在传真文件之后便已将原件焚毁。尽管CBS和拉瑟在两周之内仍然坚持所用文件的真实性，但其他新闻组织的进一步考证和《今日美国》（USA Today）与CBS本身对文件的分析引起了对其有效性的疑问，最终导致9月20日CBS的公开否定和道歉。拉瑟在节目中说：“If I knew then what I know now—I would not have gone ahead with the story as it was aired（播出）， and I certainly would not have used the documents in question.”CBS新闻部总裁安德鲁·海沃德对事件也深表遗憾：“Based on what we now know， CBS News cannot prove that the documents are authentic， which is the only acceptable journalistic standard to justify using them in the report. We should not have used them. That was a mistake， which we deeply regret.”

数月之后，CBS任命了一个独立委员会对事件进行调查。该委员会批评了CBS最初的新闻节目制作和事件之后的“自我辩护”。据此，CBS解雇了玛丽·梅普思，另外几位资深新闻节目制片人被迫辞职，CBS向观众道歉。该委员会没有具体认定这些文件是否系伪造，但认为节目组制片人未能证明这些文件的真实性。

3. 《真相》再度引发争议

吉利安文件争议事件于2015年被搬上银幕，根据玛丽·梅普思的回忆录《真相与职责：媒体、总统与特权》改编，由著名影星罗伯特·雷德福（Robert Redford）和凯特·布兰切特（Cate Blanchett）分别饰演丹·拉瑟和玛丽·梅普思。

《真相》在多伦多国际电影节上受到热烈欢迎，《好莱坞报道》（Hollywood Reporter）甚至提名该片为电影节最佳影片（好莱坞向来是讨厌共和党而倾向民主党的）。但这部投资960万美元的影片收益并不成功，仅收获了540万美元的全球票房。依据148篇影评，烂番茄网站给予该片61%的支持率和6.2/10的得分。Metacritic电影网站依据35篇影评给予该片百分制66分的较为正面的打分。Rogerebet.com影评人Brian Tallerico高度赞赏布兰切特和雷德福的表演，但认为影片中的主人公不过是导演范德比尔特政治观点的喉舌而已。

CBS的反应则完全是负面的。影片的拍摄没有得到CBS的同意，CBS也拒绝播出该片的宣传广告。CBS集团发言人批评该片对该事件事实的歪曲：“Its astounding how little truth there is in Truth. There are， in fact， too many distortions（歪曲）， evasions（回避）and baseless conspiracy theories（阴谋论）to enumerate（列举）them all. The film tries to turn gross errors（重大错误）of journalism and judgment into acts of heroism and martyrdom（殉难）”。

当事人拉瑟则对《真相》和雷德福的表演赞扬有加。说到影片，拉瑟认为影片有助于人们了解电视新闻节目制作复杂的真实程序：“theres so much right in the film... I think its the best thing thats ever been up on the big screen about how television news really works， the reporting side of it： the telephone calls， wearing out the shoe leather（踏破铁鞋）going to see people， developing sources.”他还赞扬雷德福对自己的刻画更注重神似而不是形似：“（Redford）did not， which I appreciated very much， try to imitate. He tried to get some essence of me as a person and as a professional.”

總之，《真相》为电影观众上了一堂关于美国电视媒体和从业人员性质、作用和特点的具体生动的解剖课。

4. 《真相》故事梗概

In the months before the US 2004 presidential election， Mary Mapes （producer of the primetime news program 60 Minutes Wednesday） and her crew consisting of Mike Smith， Lucy Scott， and Colonel Roger Charles are seeking evidence to verify whether or not George W. Bush received any preferential treatment（优待）during his time in the military. Charles， knowing that the military “is good at what they do” and believes that there were no mistakes or errors despite some claims that Bushs records were lost， that the records were altered， and how Bush had difficulty meeting minimal physical aptitude testing（体能测试）. Seeking any and all leads（线索）， Mapes and her crew eventually find Bill Burkett who tells them that he has hard evidence in the form of memos（便条）and letters dictating that Bush did indeed have preferential treatment. Eventually， Mapes writes a story which Dan Rather reports upon in an edition of 60 Minutes.

After the airing， Mapes and Rather face accuracy questions on the segmen（t节目）. The core documents on which these allegations（指控）were based were immediately called into question by a variety of sources with some indicating the documents being forgeries（伪造物）first appeared on a blog， which was then investigated and amplified（详述）by various talk radio hosts（注：美国的广播电台大多拥护和支持共和党，而电视媒体则倾向民主党）， bloggers and numerous mainstream media sources， including The Washington Post and CBS itself. They easily found that certain characteristics of the memos， such as its font（字体）and letter spacing， indicated the memos were created on a computer using Microsoft Word， and therefore could not have been typed on a typewriter in the early 1970s. Subsequently， Burkett who produced the documents admitted that he had lied about where he had obtained them.

After the scandal in which Mapes， her crew， and Rather are faced with charges of using Mapes liberal political agenda for the segment. One by one they are forced to face an internal review panel（內部审查委员会）to determine whether or not political bias（政治倾向）was used in the report. Smith， Scott， and Charles go into it， but are eventually banned from their work and subsequently fired with Smith going on a rant（咆哮）in the office before being escorted（押送）out. Rather faces the music（接受惩罚）and decides that after the hearing（听证会）， he will retire from broadcasting along with Mapes. While Mapes faces the board， she comes under heavy fire（遭到强烈攻击）about her agenda for the segment. Mapes stands up for herself and presents her evidence for her side. After the hearing， Mapes is fired and Rather makes his last broadcast， citing how courage helped him and his crew get through the toughest of times.

5. 精彩台词

Dan Rathers Farewell Speech on “Courage”

“Weve shared a lot in the 24 years weve been meeting here each evening（拉瑟主持CBS新闻节目长达24年）. And before I say good night， this night， I need to say thank you. Thank you to the thousands of wonderful professionals at CBS News past and present with whom its been my honor to work over these years. And a deeply felt thanks to all of you who have let us into your homes night after night. It has been a privilege， and one never taken lightly. To a nation still nursing a broken heart for what happened here in 2001（指911恐怖袭击事件）， and especially those who found themselves closest to the events of September the 11th. To our soldiers， our sailors， our airmen（飞行员）and Marines（海军）in dangerous places. And to those who have endured the tsunami（海啸）. And to all who have suffered natural disasters and who must find the will to rebuild. To the oppressed and to those whose lot（命运）it is to struggle in financial hardship or in failing health. To my fellow journalists in places where reporting the truth means risking all. And to each of you， courage！ For the CBS Evening News Dan Rather reporting. Good night.”