I Will Genuinely Be Surprised If the Washington Post Makes It Through Obama's First Term
Why oh why can't we have a better press corps? The Washington Post can't even do he said-she said journamalistic stenography anymore...
Shorter Washington Post Ombudsman Andrew Alexander:
BillEPilgrim, via Duncan Black: The Washington Post writer was worried about offending right wing conservatives, and hoped to avoid getting hate mail from them.
Pilgrim goes on:
Over and over, the Washington Post seems concerned with bending over backwards to avoid offending the small percentage of extreme right wing letter writers who deluge it with letters. Maybe this can serve as a wake up call. Offending bigoted, extreme right wing readers is not the worst thing that can happen. The Post's obsession with avoiding angry responses from Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck devotees has become, well, obsessive...
Indeed. Here is how Andrew Alexander begins his piece:
Andrew Alexander - Profile on Anti-Gay-Marriage Activist Provokes Wrath: The Post recently featured a story by reporter Monica Hesse that ran on the front of the Style section while she was on vacation. The day before returning, she logged on to check e-mails -- and wept. She was buried by an avalanche of messages angrily attacking her lengthy Aug. 28 profile of Brian Brown, executive director of the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), the group leading the fight against legalization of same-sex marriage. Hesse was stunned. She had expected to hear from anti-gay-marriage conservatives who might view the story as "snide"...
And then, of course, Andrew Alexander becomes incoherent:
Profile on Anti-Gay-Marriage Activist Provokes Wrath: I agree that the story fell short, but not because [Monica] Hesse was naïve or lacked journalistic diligence.... [T]hree things -- a storytelling concept, a writing technique and a bad headline -- combined to ignite reader reaction as vitriolic as any I've experienced in my seven months as ombudsman. Hesse's profile began:
The nightmares of gay marriage supporters are the Pat Robertsons of the world. The James Dobsons, the John Hagees -- the people who specialize in whipping crowds into frothy frenzies, who say things like Katrina was caused by the gays. The gay marriage supporters have not met Brian Brown. They should. He might be more worth knowing about...
Brown... [is] civil, "instantly likable" and a "thoughtful talker." Brown is effective because "he is pleasantly, ruthlessly sane." Hesse said she decided to let Brown tell his story, as opposed to extensively quoting what others say about him. Her editors didn't object to the concept. Having Brown's story told in his "voice," Hesse reasoned, would allow readers to best assess his arguments....
"In a profile piece, for a controversial figure like that... there should certainly be the other side of it," said Fred Karger, head of a group called Californians Against Hate. In retrospect, Style editor Lynn Medford agrees. "The lesson is to always, in some way, represent the other side," she said. Karger, who has fought with Brown over same-sex marriage in California, said, "He is just as shrill, just as anti-gay as any of the leading gay-bashers" have been over the years.
Compounding the story's problems were passages like: "He takes nothing personally. He means nothing personal. He is never accusatory or belittling." These types of unattributed characterizations are not uncommon in feature writing. But many readers thought Hesse was offering her opinion of who Brown is, as opposed to portraying how he comes across.
Finally, the headline: "Opposing Gay Unions With Sanity & a Smile." To many readers, The Post was saying Brown's views are sane...
