This case study is involved in an issue from the publishing of an article called, "A Rape on Campus" from The Rolling Stone magazine. The article was made on Nov. 19, 2014, and about an incident that occurred at a Phi Kappa Psi fraternity initiation event. An off-the-record source accused the fraternity of rape by seven members of the fraternity at the University of Virginia while two others watched, according to an article from the Washington Post. The magazine described it as a brutal gang rape hazing ritual. The article was written by Sabrina Erderly and she made the decision to publish this article before the fact that the woman came out and said that she was lying the whole time. The source who went by "Jackie" had fabricated the information. There wasn't a lot of evidence to begin with as the police got involved in the case and could not find sufficient evidence, according to a peer-reviewed journal called Journal of Media Ethics. In April 2015, the Columbia Journalism review took action and wrote a report called, "Rolling Stones' investigation: A failure that was avoidable" which explains what went wrong. Soon after Rolling Stone magazine retracted the article in 2015 Phi Kappa Psi sued the publication and settled for $1.65 million in 2017, according to a news article from the Washington Post.

There are many ethical issues that arise from the 9,000-word article that seems to be common amongst journalists. The news outlet published fabricated information to its readers and put the fraternities' reputation in jeopardy. Lying to its readers is never the goal for journalists all around the world, especially in the era of the credibility gap. This article provided an example as to why so many people in the United States do not trust the news to be accurate and objective. Critical thinking did not occur during the creation of this phony news story as it is hard to get a story with only one anonymous source. It is better that you get both sides of the story and dig deeper before you decide to make this story public. Especially a story about such a serious topic in sexual assault. According to the SPJ Code of Ethics, ethical journalism strives to ensure the free exchange of information that is accurate, fair and thorough. This article fails to provide all three of these standards as they did not seek truth and report it. For example, Rolling Stone magazine didn't take responsibility for the accuracy of their work and verify the information before releasing it. With a sexual assault case, it's vitally important that you are accurate and minimize harm because Phi Kappa Psi got serious backlash from these allegations. Also, the article failed to minimize harm as ethical journalism should treat sources, subjects, colleagues and members of the public as human beings deserving of respect. The Rolling Stone Magazine did not balance the public's need for information against potential harm. The only good thing that the news outlet did was be accountable and transparent as they acknowledged the mistakes and apologized. Sabrina Erderly went with a narrow vision of ethical decision-making as to not looking at the grand scheme of what went on during the investigation and really jumped to conclusions without much thought. Ethics problems that call into question journalistic credibility often prompt an elaborate response by journalists "to restore their own image and reputation," a process that scholars have defined as "paradigm repair", according to a peer-reviewed journal called Framing Blame in Sexual Assault: An analysis of attribution in news stories about sexual assault on college campuses.

The main solutions for this ethical problem are to be accountable which includes an apology and its decision to seek an independent investigation, according to a peer-reviewed journal called Journal of Media Ethics. These are things that the publication had already done but I believe that there were other solutions that could've been done in order to not have to apologize. There could have been a better method of fact-checking as they could've let the police and the university handle the situation first before making a final decision of publishing the story. Title IX of handling sexual assault allegations state that the failure to ensure adequate representation for the accused, particularly for students unable to afford representation, according to a scholarly journal called The case in favor of OCR's tougher Title IX policies: pushing back against the pushback. Although issues of sexual assault may continue to occupy newspaper headlines, journalists can take constructive steps to cover these cases with fair and honest reporting and think deeper about the ways in which their reporting works to frame and attribute blame to the parties in their story. Moreover, as readers, we should more closely examine the media's reports of such cases with a lens to think more critically about the facts of the case and the various ways in which facts can be presented. And finally, as a society in general, we should consider the impact our communication has on the perceptions of sexual assault cases facing our nation's colleges and universities, according to a scholarly journal called Framing Blame in Sexual Assault: An analysis of Attribution in News Stories About Sexual Assault on College Campuses.