Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist

Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Md Troopers Assoc #20 & Westminster Md Fire Dept Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Showing posts with label Journalism sloppy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Journalism sloppy. Show all posts

Friday, March 21, 2014

L'Wren Scott, and the awful truth about women's obituaries-Well written By Stassa Edwards March 20, 2014 Just saying

L'Wren Scott, and the awful truth about women's obituaries-Well written By Stassa Edwards March 20, 2014 Just saying


Coverage of the fashion designer's passing was just the latest example of a sad journalistic tradition

By Stassa Edwards March 20, 2014

When news broke that respected fashion designer L'Wren Scott had passed away on Monday, The New York Times noted her suicide with the regrettable headline "Mick Jagger's Girlfriend Found Dead."

The Times wasn't alone in its faux pas; the Associated Press dutifully tweeted, "BREAKING: Law enforcement: Mick Jagger' [sic] girlfriend, L'Wren Scott, found dead in NYC of possible suicide." Though the AP managed to slip Scott's name in the headline of the report, both news organizations seemed to agree: Scott's death was newsworthy only because of her romantic association with a legendary rock and roller. Editors at neither The New York Times nor the Associated Press seemed to grasp that Scott's untimely death was newsworthy because of her professional accomplishments.

One would think that after the stroganoff incident, the Gray Lady in particular would have found a better way to note the passing of accomplished women, but it clearly hasn't. The poor handling of Scott's death speaks more broadly to the difficulty of recounting a woman's life — namely the determination of a hierarchy of facts, a project that should seem gender neutral but rarely is. It often seems natural enough to define women by their relationships — wife, mother, girlfriend, etc. — and let famous men be memorialized for their accomplishments, their family lives taking a backseat. This was certainly the case with the aforementioned stroganoff incident, in which the Times' obituary writers downgraded Yvette Brill from rocket scientist to pretty good cook.


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Sunday, December 12, 2010

Too Good to Check By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

OP-ED COLUMNIST

Too Good to Check


On Nov. 4, Anderson Cooper did the country a favor. He expertly deconstructed on his CNN show the bogus rumor that President Obama’s trip to Asia would cost $200 million a day. This was an important “story.” It underscored just how far ahead of his time Mark Twain was when he said a century before the Internet, “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” But it also showed that there is an antidote to malicious journalism — and that’s good journalism.
Josh Haner/The New York Times
Thomas L. Friedman

Readers' Comments

Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
In case you missed it, a story circulated around the Web on the eve of President Obama’s trip that it would cost U.S. taxpayers $200 million a day — about $2 billion for the entire trip. Cooper said he felt impelled to check it out because the evening before he had had Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, a Republican and Tea Party favorite, on his show and had asked her where exactly Republicans will cut the budget.
Instead of giving specifics, Bachmann used her airtime to inject a phony story into the mainstream. She answered: “I think we know that just within a day or so the president of the United States will be taking a trip over to India that is expected to cost the taxpayers $200 million a day. He’s taking 2,000 people with him. He’ll be renting over 870 rooms in India, and these are five-star hotel rooms at the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. This is the kind of over-the-top spending.” ...  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/17/opinion/17friedman.html

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