BCC and the sound of crying

The BBC has run into another row about deception according to the Guardian of November 16, 2007.
John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford released video of recently-born quintuplets and the BBC used the video, adding its own soundtrack of crying babies. The BBC told the Guardian: "We received the film without sound and although we don't believe viewers were materially misled, we should not have added sound to the pictures."
This is the latest such ethical mistake in a growing list for the BBC that includes premium phone line abuses, faked footage of the Queen and has led to Director General Mark Thompson to try to ban 'noddies' - the method used by TV journalists to allow cutaways and give the impression the interview was filmed by two TV cameras instead of the one that is all news can afford to send on most stories these days.
Adding sound or new backgrounds to video these days is very easy, but careful consideration needs to be given before doing it. I was approached recently by a private group to film my views in a rebuttal of a BBC programme. I was surprised at the use of a white muslin background for the recording, but even more surprised at the sumptious study in which I was shown in the final edit. Chromakey had done its work to set me in this new environment and whilst no-one was materially misled, the recording was not recorded where it was shown to have been recorded.
It is very easy to say that these additions do not materially change the truth, but they are a slippery slope to other editing tricks that do substantially change reality. Putting me in a study befitting a university professor may not be too bad even if the reality is that my study looks more like a library dumping ground. But if the background gave the impression that I was chatting amongst friends, some of whom were later cut into the edit to give views that made it seem I was responding to their promptings, an entirely incorrect picture might have been painted.
The same is true of added audio. Adding babies crying to film of a neo-natal ward may not be too deluding. But what if that crying were added to a documentary about orphanages in Eastern Europe to give the impression that these orphanages were ill-treating their charges? The same is true of adding music. News traditionally does not have a music soundtrack, making it unusual for TV and radio. Ths is clearly because of the emotive effect of soundtracks - it would be impossible to claim that news is unbiased if a sound track were added. But many documentaries now add sound tracks of music, setting the scene and pointing the viewer in a particular direction, often without them realising it.
Adding additional sounds or music, or changing a video background as well as adding or deleting items in pictures or video should be avoided at all costs in order to prevent misleading the audience. Only if some far worse ethical incident would occur if one did not, should this be considered. There's always one surefire way to be accused of manipulating the truth and attempting to deceive and that's by deliberately manipulating the truth.