Photojournalism Ethics

Morals are absolute, a firm line between right and wrong. Ethics are not necesarily the same thing, as they usually deal with emotions and making offense. The moral is firmly, "It is wrong to lie," But the ethic that "It is wrong to manipulate a photo" is not so clear-cut.
Situations change all the time - that's what makes them situations. If a photographer changes their rules according to circumstances, they're not really rules, just whims of whatever would be right at that moment. Right and wrong aren't really right and wrong if they're always changing, and rules aren't rules if they're changing too.

A photograph captures reality in the sense that it shows the exact positions of things and people at a precise moment. However, it does not always tell the whole story - someone with an angry-looking face could actually have a stomacheache or something, while the photograph may make them look like they're full of hatred.

As a photographer, I've "edited" reality by altering the colors in a photograph to make it look, well, cooler. As the photos were intended to be artistic anyway, and not representations of a true moment, it's perfectly okay. Cropping photographs is the way I've altered photojournalism photographs, but only to cut off empty space, not other people.

Newspapers definately should have absolute rules regarding photomanipulation because, being an organization, they have a lot of responsibility. As there are a lot of people who will view their photos, people need to know they can count on the newspaper's unwavering credibility that the photograph is real.

Evolution of Beauty

The changes on the model were:
They made the lips bigger
They made her neck longer and thinner
They made her brow lower, her eyebrows higher, and her eyes bigger
They changed the shading on her face to make it look slightly different shape
They smoothed the edges of her face

The resulting photograph drastically changes the truth. However, as this is not photojournalism, the picture is not intended to show the truth. It is an advertisement, and when do advertisements tell the whole truth anyway?
If the picture is intended to show the person as they really are, then it's wrong to do so much manipulation. If the picture is merely intended to advertise a product, and the subject is voluntary, then there's not much of a problem.
It would be wrong to change the subject's face in anyway if she did not give her consent.
Fashion photography is only related to photojournalism in the sense that they use cameras to capture images of people. While photojournalism is intended to show the truth, fashion journalism is intended to make their subjects look beautiful by whatever means. The ethics of photojournalism deal with truth and viewer impact, while the ethics of fashion photography only has to deal with the subject's consent.