Memo to NFL: Keep vests, lose logos
In order for our work as journalists to mean anything and to be taken seriously, we must bring to our work a number of qualities.
That list is lengthy, but a short version certainly includes accuracy, fairness and independence. We quickly lose the trust of our readers if we are factually wrong time and time again. Or if we refuse to consider or report certain sides and angles of a story. Or if readers perceive that we are beholden to some interest -- corporate or otherwise -- that would trump or even marginally compromise our ability to tell stories independently and impartially.
The latter item is the one that comes into play as the National Football League has created a brouhaha with a new rule for photographers who cover their games.
The rule, simply, is that photographers must, as part of their game credentials, wear league-issued red vests that bear two corporate logos: one for Reebok, which manufacturers the vests, and one for Canon, an NFL sponsor.
Several news organizations -- including the National Press Photographers Association, the American Society of Newspaper Editors and the Associated Press Managing Editors -- are objecting on the grounds that the logos compel independent photojournalists to act as walking advertisements for a pair of corporations.
While it's true that some major, one-time sporting events have required vests bearing logos before, this to our knowledge is the first time a professional sports league has instituted such a requirement for all of its contests.
The concern is not that photographers will shed their credibility the instant they don the logo vest or, in our case, will shoot Bears games differently in order to please Canon or Reebok.
The problem, as it is so often, is one of appearance. And degree. Observers might not give much thought to the Reebok logo, as it makes the vests, or even to Canon, since cameras are a photographer's essential tool.
What, though, if the NFL were to decide next year that it could make a little additional money by adding to the vests the logo of a soft drink? Or a home improvement store? Or one brand of power tool? Or beer? At what point does the vest go from looking like a credential for a photojournalist to looking like a billboard inextricably linked to the photographer wearing it?
Many photographers like the requirement of an unadorned vest because its helps league officials quickly tell apart those who are working a game from onlookers who somehow got a place on the sideline, but are serving mostly to get in the way of actual photojournalists.
The solution seems simple enough for a league that faces far bigger problems than trying to make journalists wear corporate logos. Keep the vests, but lose the logos, and let our photographers do their jobs without even a hint of compromised interests.