Al Jazeera English isn’t the only news group to avoid words like “terrorist” and “militants” when it reports on terrorist events — the Qatar-based news agency is joined by the likes of Reuters, the BBC and the Associated Press.
But it’s not about political correctness, officials in these newsrooms argue, it’s about maintaining objectivity and accuracy.
“There is no BBC ban on the word ‘terrorist’, though we prefer a more precise description if possible. As our Editorial Guidelines make clear, careful use of the word ‘terrorist’ is essential for the BBC to maintain its standards of accuracy and impartiality,” a network spokesperson told the Washington Examiner Friday.
It appears these news groups are quite serious about avoiding terms they say could muddle their reporting.
“We don’t use the labels ‘Islamist,’ for example, or ‘extremist.’ We usually let the group’s actions speak for themselves. We don’t give that group a particular label,” Al Jazeera English North Africa correspondent Nazanine Moshiri said in a video produced by the news group.
Following the Jan. 27 massacre of 10 journalists at the offices of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, Al Jazeera English executive Carlos van Meek in an internal memo obtained by National Review Online instructed his reporters to avoid such terms as “terrorist,” “militant,” “Islamist” and “jihad.”
“We manage our words carefully around here,” he wrote, directing the organization’s reporters to avoid the aforementioned list of words that “have a tendency of tripping us up.”
The two attackers walked into the Charlie Hebdo newsroom and methodically mowed down the publication’s editor, several of its cartoonists and half a dozen writers. They did because of cartoons published by the magazine that mocked Islam and Muhammed.
This is not the first time that the Qatar-based news group’s word choices have come under scrutiny, as editors and correspondents have in the past remarked on this very issue.
“We found ourselves referring to Boko Haram and the Muslim Brotherhood using the same catch-all phrase, ‘Islamist,’ and we found that wasn’t appropriate. And we felt that because of our expertise in this part of the world, we should be making the distinction around that to our audiences,” news editor Simon Torkington said in November 2014.
“To someone, ‘Islamist’ might be a pejorative word or a word that you wouldn’t apply to someone, although to other people, it’s completely innocuous. We tend to avoid them for those reasons,” said executive producer Nick Toksvig.
An Al Jazeera spokesperson defended van Meek’s list of off-limits words, telling the Examiner this week the Arabic news operation is “not the only media outlet at the center of discussions on language.” And to the extent that other newsrooms avoid key terms when reporting on terrorist attacks, the Al Jazeera spokesperson is correct.
Reuters, for example, explains in its style guide why its editors and reporters are to avoid words like “terror,” “terrorism,” “terror attack” and “terror cell:”
Elsewhere, the Associated Press is careful to avoid the term “Islamist” unless it fits a specific set of guidelines, saying in 2013 that the term should not be used as “a synonym for Islamic fighters, militants, extremists or radicals.”
When the AP first added “Islamist” to its stylebook in 2012, it defined it as: “Supporter of government in accord with the laws of Islam. Those who view the Quran as a political model encompass a wide range of Muslims, from mainstream politicians to militants known as jihadi.”
More recently, after receiving significant pushback from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the AP clarified its definition: “An advocate or supporter of a political movement that favors reordering government and society in accordance with laws prescribed by Islam. Do not use as a synonym for Islamic fighters, militants, extremists or radicals, who may or may not be Islamists.
“Where possible, be specific and use the name of militant affiliations: al Qaeda-linked, Hezbollah, Taliban, etc. Those who view the Quran as a political model encompass a wide range of Muslims, from mainstream politicians to militants known as jihadi,” the definition read.
The updated definition was praised by CAIR.
The AP is also reluctant to use the word “terrorist” or “terrorism,” preferring to wait instead for authorities to use those terms.
“In general, we shy away from independently labeling people as terrorists and would factually note if someone has been listed or labeled as such by someone else, such as the FBI or another government entity,” AP spokesman Paul Colford said in 2014.
He added there are exceptions to the rule, pointing to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the 2013 Nairobi shopping mall massacre as clear examples. But even in the case of the Nairobi attacks, several U.S. newsrooms were reluctant to label the murder spree as “terrorism.”
A Washington Post front page, for example, blared the headline: “Kenyan Forces Move Into Mall, Rescue Many.” Again, the word “terrorist” did not appear in the following story, but it did cite “Islamist militants.”
“Security Forces Launch Assault to End Mall Standoff,” the Chicago Tribune headlined its story that laid blame for the attack on “Somali militants.”
Debate over which terms and phrases should be omitted from reporting on events like the Charlie Hebdo attack and the Nairobi mall assault is not unique to American newsrooms.
BBC reporters, for example, were instructed following the Charlie Hebdo massacre to avoid referring to the attackers as “terrorists.”
“We try to avoid describing anyone as a terrorist or an act as being terrorist. What we try to do is to say that ‘two men killed 12 people in an attack on the office of a satirical magazine’. That’s enough, we know what that means and what it is,” BBC Arabic chief Tarik Kafala said at the time in an interview with the Independent, adding that the word “terrorist” has many meanings.
“Terrorism is such a loaded word. The UN has been struggling for more than a decade to define the word and they can’t. It is very difficult to. We know what political violence is, we know what murder, bombings and shootings are and we describe them. That’s much more revealing, we believe, than using a word like terrorist, which people will see as value-laden,” he said.
Similarly, Guardian deputy editor David Shariatmadari asked Tuesday whether it’s time for newsrooms everywhere to retire the word “terrorist.”
“[T]he word itself casts a shadow of fear. Politicians deploy it to justify illiberal measures. The panic it evokes ramps up prejudice against minorities. It is even used to win support for wars. Wielded carefully, ‘terrorist’ could still make sense,” he wrote. “Used to frighten, cajole or slander, it’s one of the most toxic words of our times.”
Such thinking is anything but universal among U.S. journalists. Weekly Standard Editor William Kristol, for example, contends timidity about words like “terrorist” indicates a reluctance to confront unpleasant facts:
“I suspect it’s a combination of political correctness, muddy thinking, timidity and, perhaps deeper down, an unwillingness to face unpleasant facts. People don’t want to face the problem head-on, because that would have foreign policy and national security implications they’d prefer not to think about.”
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This article has been update to include comment from the BBC.
