What ethical concerns should PR consider when commenting on movements like Blacklivesmatter?

 

If you are always managing a crisis in which some of them cannot even wait until the next business day and on top of that you want to find out the ethical concerns to consider when commenting on movements like blacklivesmatter would be a difficult task.

Major brands and the people, in general, have spoken out showing support to the movement of blacklivesmatter especially after George Floyd’s killing in which have changed the world in the way people see the treatment of black people by the police and other institutions that includes the private sector as well in which they had to change the way they used to communicate with the people of colour especially the black people which means in a way showing support to the movement and at the same time reviewing their communications in the past and the present with the black people making sure it does not offend the black people in any way shape or form, and if it does removing it from their platforms and apologizing it as well.

Also, a lot of businesses have started what is called brand activism in which they express their views and where they stand on issues like the environment, social, or political and this has caused a huge amount of consumers to show support and rewarding to those businesses who openly took stand on such issues and that could mean first it is a good thing for businesses to get involved on what their consumers care about and secondly it is a major opportunity for the businesses in which they can create a strong moral and emotional connection with their consumers and also attract new consumers which are happy with the businesses stand on those issues.

So, in terms of what ethical concerns should PR consider when commenting on movements lie blacklivesmatter, first they should do their research on the movement from the background, history, the amount of influence they have, how extreme they are, how they could possibly affect you or the organisation you working as their PR practitioner, and so on.

Also, the PR people should keep in mind to not offend any other group of people, religion, race, or ethnicity while considering the best possible way of commenting on movements like blacklivesmatter, furthermore, while considering commenting on the movement it should be discussed or allowed to get involved by someone related to the movement who can actually feel and have the experience on what could possibly offend or could not offend the movement and their followers.

Timing is also very important as it would not be a good idea to comment when tensions are high and people, in general, are emotional including the person who is commenting as things could go wrong easily or something that should not be said might be said due to the emotional feelings at the time, so it would be a good idea to wait until you are no longer emotional and you have got all the information needed to comment on the issue.

Other ethical concern that should be considered is the media type that would be communicated as it is very important for example, if you use Fox News as the media channel to comment on blacklivesmatter movement it would be a disaster and no matter how good your comment is it will still be interpreted as a comment of someone who is against the movement, so it would be a good idea to think about the type of media channel to use to communicate or comment a specific movement.

The choice of words used to comment movements like blacklivesmatter is also very important to be deeply thought about it before releasing any comment or PR statement to the public as it could cause damage to your reputation or the organisation you representing as their PR practitioner, an example could be during the blacklivesmatter protests in the UK and around the world after George Floyd’s killing the Labour party leader Sir Kier Starmer commented on the issue at the time by calling the blacklivesmatter protests “A moment” also saying that defunding the police is a nonsense, then after that his comments has caused an outrage not just the blacklivesmatter movement and its supporters but also some Labour MPs like Florence Eshalomi which criticised him by saying “His choice of words was wrong” then after that he decided to speak to the UK black journalists to explain his comments, then he also did some damage control by speaking with the BBC by simply saying “ I did not mean it that way and people misinterpreted his words and so on.” So that shows how important it is to think about the words that you are using, also commenting on every issue or movement is not always a must-do thing, some issues maybe not appropriate for you or your organisation to comment on it, so it needs some clever thinking to figure out on what is relevant what is appropriate for you or your organisation to comment and what to not as it may damage your reputation or the organisation’s and it is a way of thinking outside the box.

In conclusion, commenting on movements like blacklivesmatter is not easy and straightforward as you may need to do a lot of research about the movement before commenting on it and you may still receive unexpected responses from the public or the movement itself, so you or the organisation you representing as their PR practitioner should always be ready for rebuttal if necessarily needed or more explanation if further questions about the comment is asked.