Tony Maddox, the executive vice president of CNN International, joined “CNN Today” to explain why the network would not show the ISIS video of the Jordanian pilot being burned to death.
So you got to ask, first of all, do we need to show this video? Is there content in this video that we cannot in any way explain to the audience short of showing the video itself? In this case, no. You can say a man was put in a cage and he was set on fire and he was burned alive. That is horrific, hideous, and completely explained what happened. So you don’t need to show the video in order to explain that or any part of the narrative.
Maddox went on to discuss if showing the video is necessary to show the inhumanity and ruthlessness of ISIS. He feels CNN has covered the story properly saying, “if you watch CNN in its entirety across all platforms, since this story emerged, no one can say we have not done this story in the most thorough and comprehensive and wide-reaching and I would say responsible way.”