Off-the-record meetings have their uses. Since not everyone is in a position to talk to the press, sometimes it’s the best, even if an imperfect, channel for opening a trail to better information—which could lead to scoops or insights later. Dishonor your agreement, and not only will sources avoid you, but other journalists could have a harder time getting access because of you.
非正式的會面還是有其用途。畢竟不是每個人都能夠和記者交談，有時它是最好的方式，即便不完美，也仍是獲得消息的管道，也可能會導致更多的獨家新聞。若不重視這個協議，不僅消息來源會遠離你，其他記者也可能因為你而更難接近消息來源。
Sometimes, in very limited circumstances, it should be okay to rethink this rule. Reporters around the world often don’t enjoy the same level of access and documentation that Americans and Western Europeans do, and this makes the job of the journalist infinitely harder. Kyunghyang’ sdecision to publish offered rare insight: A top official was being straightforward, and his statements were going down on the record with—remarkably—his name attached. Just the fact he was this candid was a big deal, whether or not his views were abhorrent.
有時候，在非常有限的情況下，重新思考這套規則是有必要的。世界各地的記者無法享有和美國西歐等國接近文件的權力，這使得記者這份職業更為艱難。京鄉新聞決定刊出這則新聞說明了：一名高階官員的直言不諱，也隨之被紀錄下來，那麼他的名字也應該被提及。事實上，他的坦率就是個大問題，無論他的觀點是否令人厭惡。
For a high-tech republic, South Korea is remarkably opaque. The Economist Intelligence Unit calls the country a “flawed democracy,” and Freedom House calls its press “partly free.” Mainstream journalism here is largely a scripted affair, more a cartel and less a watchdog. Since trust in journalists here is already low—a trendy phrase, kiraegi, means “journalist trash”—candid footage or on-record commentary is hard to find. The South Korean president gave her first press conference 10 months after taking office, and her administration has since gone after reporters who question the official line. Government spokespeople demand anonymity even at public briefings. Defamation lawsuits and legal threats, even for satire, are common. Unlike in the US, where the spirit of defamation laws is to protect free speech, South Korea (and much of East Asia) gives more weight to protecting a person’s public honor against true and newsworthy statements.
以一個高科技的國家來說，韓國是非常不透明的。經濟學人智庫（The Economist Intelligence Unit）認為韓國是個「部份民主」的國家，自由之家（Freedom House）也認為韓國的媒體是「部分的自由」。韓國主流媒體多數是照本宣科的產業，比較像是企業的附庸，而不是看門狗。由於人民對記者信任度已經很低，一個新興的詞彙也因此而生—kiraegi，意思是「垃圾記者」。直擊影像或正式紀錄的評論是很難找到。韓國總統上任10個月後才舉行第一次記者會，在記者質疑她的政策後，官員也早就辭職了。政府發言人甚至公開要求匿名。誹謗訴訟和法律威脅，甚至是為了嘲諷等情事，在韓國是屢見不鮮。不像美國，誹謗法的立法精神是保護言論自由，南韓（和很多東亞國家）則看重個人的聲譽更勝過事實和新聞承述的考量。
National leaders, as such, are praised to great heights. More than 70 years after the end of World War II, Japan’s mainstream newspapers still treat it as taboo to talk about whether the deceased former emperor played an active role in the conflict. (Imagine if FDR’s presidency were still touchy for the New York Times.) South Korean media, meanwhile, hold back from challenging powerful corporate dynasties, many of whom, including the Samsung Chairman, have been convicted of white-collar crimes and then presidentially pardoned. Imagine how odd it would be if Steve Jobs were a two-time convicted criminal, pardoned twice by Bill Clinton and then Obama—and Walter brushed over this in his biography.
國家領導人也因此被吹捧到一定的高度。二次世界大戰過後的70年，日本的主流報紙仍將談論過往君王在戰事中扮演的角色視為禁忌（想像羅斯福政府仍是紐約時報難以取悅的對象）。同時，南韓媒體又不敢挑戰這些大企業，其中包括曾被判定有罪，但又被赦免的三星集團董事長。想像一下，如果今天賈伯斯是一個被定罪兩次的罪犯，又被美國總統克林頓和歐巴馬赦免兩次，Isaacson（賈伯斯傳記作者）則草率的在傳記中帶過此事，這是多麼的詭異。
Since the official narrative is overpowering, the counter-narrative is equally vicious. Conspiracy theories and rumors roar through non-mainstream and social media, laden with anonymous sources and bullying, at times sounding like Donald Trump writing a textbook for first graders. “According to a source in the finance industry, Jews have a robust network demonstrating influence in a number of domains,” opined the business publication Money Today last year.
官方的敘事往往是一面倒的，反敘事也同樣強烈。陰謀論和謠言在非主流媒體和社交媒體上流竄，網路上充斥著匿名消息和霸凌事件，有時候聽起來就像川普為一年級學生寫教科書一樣荒謬。「根據一位金融業的消息來源透露，猶太人有一個強大的網絡在許多領域都有極大影響力」，韓國財經刊物Money Today去年曾如此寫道。
The periodical was attacking a New York-based hedge fund, Elliott Management, for its shareholder challenge against Samsung, the nation’s crown jewel, last summer. Months later, the opposite happened. In July, the independent news website NewsTapa released a prostitution video, which was secretly filmed and used in a blackmail attempt, of what reporters believed was the Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Kun-hee meeting up to five women at two residences and handing out payments of about $4,500 each—with some evidence of the connivance of an executive.
這本週刊所批評的，是去年夏天位於紐約的對沖基金伊里亞德管理公司（Elliott Management），為了其股東的權益和素有「皇冠上的珍珠」的三星集團之間的股權爭議事件。幾個月後，事情發展令人意外。今年7月，獨立新聞網站NewsTapa公佈了一則偷拍的賣淫影片，內容是關於三星電子董事長李健熙，以每次大約4,500美金的價碼，和五名女子在兩個不同場所的性交易過程—一些證據指出和行政的舞弊事件有關。
The wealthiest man in the nation, feted as an emperor, was intimately on display as hardly a god at all. Yet despite legitimate questions over company involvement, and a probe by prosecutors for prostitution, mainstream outlets portrayed him foremost as a victim of a voyeur camera and journalistic malpractice.
南韓最富有的人，過著像是帝王般的生活，這麼私密的影片被流出是幾乎不可能的。然而，儘管合法性的問題遠大於企業的涉入，檢察官也對賣淫事件展開探查，但主流媒體卻將李健熙形塑成一個偷窺事件和新聞報導的受害者。
Problems like these are not the outlier, but are alarmingly common. And it presents a dichotomy: as a Korean journalist, the system doesn’t allow for much of a middle ground between mouthpiece and conspiracy monger. Follow the strictures of the cartel, and you are almost guaranteed to be pushing an official line, at times recklessly against interests of your readers. But expose the inner workings of the system, and you’ll have to behave in a way that would raise the eyebrows of any American ombudsman.
諸如此類問題都不令人意外，甚至很常見。它劃分了一個極端的視野：作為一個韓國記者，並不被允許追求一個介於傳聲筒和陰謀販子之間的灰色地帶。受到企業的拑制，你幾乎只能和官方站在同一陣線，也等同罔顧了讀者的利益。但要揭露其中的媒體運作生態，你又得小心引起美國政府官員的注意。
Sometimes, pushing the ethical boundaries is the only way, ironically, to write honest stories. The fact that an elite civil servant felt comfortable getting inebriated with journalists and spewing racial obscenities suggests a media environment where readers aren’t the first priority. Clearly, he anticipated the comforts of an off-record media relationship far removed from the original purpose and principles of off-the-record agreements aimed at delivering facts and context to readers without putting sources at risk. That, along with the overall press environment of restriction, supports the decision to publish.
諷刺的是，挑戰道德極限的唯一出路，是寫出誠實的報導。一位精英公務員酒酣耳熟後隨口說出種族歧視言論，說明了讀者在媒體生態中從來不是優先考量。顯然地，他原本所預期和媒體的關係，已和過往立基於提供事實和背景給讀者，決不危害到消息來源權益的原則相去甚遠。也就是說，在這受限的媒體環境中，出版決策思維也得有所改變。
Globally, there haven’t been many cases as extreme involving off-the-record comments becoming public. But when it happens, it’s because there was some sort strong public interest. In 2005, Australian media revolted against a senator, Ross Lightfoot, whose off-record tale about delivering $20,000 in cash to Kurdish officials in Iraq as part of a donation for a hospital—on behalf of an oil company—contradicted his claims later to the public. The Australian, in response, decided to abandon its agreement.
全球普遍來看，沒有太多涉及「非正式談話」的新聞事件，但是當它發生了，就代表符合公共利益的需求。在2005年，澳大利亞媒體反抗參議員Lightfoot的「非正式談話」謊言—給予伊拉克的庫德族官員現金20,000美元做為建造醫院的捐款，然而這是用一家石油公司名義所捐贈，這與他之後對大眾所宣稱的完全相反。澳洲人報（The Australian）就決定放棄協議揭露整起事件。
Keeping the secret would have ceded far too much editorial control to a man abusing the privilege. Imagine an Obama administration official abruptly contradicting himself on a public-interest matter, or spewing racial hatred off-the-record. Would the American press have stayed quiet?
保守這個秘密，只會讓編輯的權限過大而無法防止濫權。若歐巴馬政府官員突然做出有違公眾利益的事情，或私下說出種族仇恨的言論，美國媒體會一直保持沉默嗎？
The Kyunghyang editor who broke the story, Chang, has been navigating a far more restrictive environment since she first joined the paper in 2005. The Kyunghyang is at times a fixture of the media cartel, flexing its muscles when necessary, but it’s also an outlier from the “big three” lineup of mainstream newspapers. Its heritage is in the nation’s pro-democracy movements; the newspaper was set up by the Catholic Church in the 1940s and challenged authoritarian governments until the 1980s.
京鄉新聞主編張銀嬌決定刊出了這則新聞，媒體環境也遠比她2005年加入京鄉時還要嚴峻。京鄉新聞有時是媒體利益集團一環，在必要時才發揮影響力，但它也是挑戰主流三大報紙的新勢力。京鄉的使命是鼓吹國內的民主運動，這份報紙在1940年代由天主教會成立，直到1980年代，一直肩負著挑戰獨裁政府的角色。
Kyunghyang has not always been a hero. In the past, its coverage has gotten out of control in support of protest movements, with emotional anti-American and xenophobic denunciations. Today, it is similar to the Nation in tone, but closer to the political center by American standards. (Disclosure: Last year, I wrote a handful of op-eds for the Kyunghyang, but have no relationship with them at present.)
京鄉新聞也不是一直都如此神勇。在過去，京鄉對於所支持的抗議運動報導，隨著高漲的反美情緒和仇外譴責言論，已失去了控制。今天，京鄉新聞則像是全國性的報紙，採取更貼近美式的標準，接近政治的核心。
Whether or not she made the right call, Chang’s case is reminder that off-the-record is a privilege granted by the journalist, not a vow of silence set down by a government official. The job of the reporter is to question it and resist it as much as possible—perhaps even revisiting the agreement when the public interest calls for it. Our relationship with the people we cover sometimes needs an element of hostility and antagonism; sometimes, they need us as much as we need them, and it can be more ethical to burn our access than to bow too hastily to the terms dictated to us.
不管張銀嬌做的決定是否正確，但提醒了人們，非正式紀錄是否公開該由記者決定，而不是政府官員所下放的特權。記者的工作是提出問題，並盡可能全力抵抗，甚至在悠關公眾利益時應重新檢視這條規定。記者與新聞人物之間的關係，有時需要點敵意和對立的元素；有時新聞人物需要記者，反之亦然。而且它可以更合乎道德的助於記者的採訪，而不是草率地限制記者的條款。
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作者：Geoffrey Cain
編譯：朱弘川
原文網址： http://www.cjr.org/analysis/south_korea_journalist_off_the_record.php
