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Phillip Blanchard	Post subject: Oh, shut up Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2002 5:24 pm
Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2002 1:01 am Posts: 8342 Location: Bethesda, Md.	Being a journalist means being human By Laurie Toupin Special to Poynter Online Dear Friend, Judging from the number of people attending Isabel Wilkerson’s talk, “The Journalism of Empathy: How to be caring and factual at the same time,” that was the place to be on Saturday afternoon from 2:00 – 3:15 p.m. In fact, there were so many people trying to cram into the room, that I felt empathy for anyone coming in late! <p>Poynter Online<p>***That's nice.***
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Bumfketeer	Post subject: Re: Oh, shut up Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2002 6:40 pm
Joined: Fri Nov 15, 2002 1:01 am Posts: 3557 Location: Cusp of retirement, grave or both	Nice indeed.
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Guest	Post subject: Re: Oh, shut up Posted: Mon Dec 02, 2002 8:57 pm
	What many of these journalists may never learn is that there's a not-so-fine line between "caring" and "cliches and condescension." To wit, the following college-poetry-journal-reject-toned-story excerpt from a Seattle-based AP scribe, awful beyond belief:<p>By Rebecca Cook The Associated Press MATLOCK — An old pickup truck turns off a lonely, two-lane country road into a crowded gravel parking lot, and 62-year-old Jerry lumbers out to join the line of people waiting for the Matlock Food Bank to open. A real estate agent before a string of heart attacks forced him into retirement and medical debt, Jerry asks that his full name not be used. He doesn’t want his children to know he relies on the food bank for staples every week. The pills that keep his heart beating cost him $200 a month, the rural property he invested in for retirement isn’t worth enough to sell, and he just can’t afford it all. He stands up straight in crisp blue jeans and a faded blue flannel shirt as he waits in line, the low, gray sky casting a pall over the parking lot. Jerry doesn’t get food stamps — his wife cans vegetables from their garden, he hunts and fishes and they raise chickens to keep food on the table. But he’s not too proud to accept help when he needs it. “We’re in a depression, not a recession,” Jerry said, gazing through thick, round glasses at the woods surrounding his hardscrabble, timber-dependent town. “Most of the people that come here, they’re my neighbors.”
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Powderhorn	Post subject: Re: Oh, shut up Posted: Tue Dec 03, 2002 3:53 am
Joined: Fri Jun 07, 2002 12:01 am Posts: 840 Location: Ashland, Ore.	Good God ... there must be at least a few more stock phrases and cliches that could have been hammered into those sentences ... though admittedly, I'm not sure how.
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"This is like group therapy with prisoners in the Poynter Institute's dungeon." ... "You take a vocation that the simple-minded consider to be mere drudgery, and you exploit every bit of fascinating and humorous nuance imaginable." ... "Delicious" ... "Ask your professors? The only professors whose opinions matter are named Walsh, Blanchard and McIntyre." ... "What I come here for, I can find ONLY here. Phillip, you've built a great place." ... "Nothing gets us hotter than reading bitchy discussion threads from over-exhausted copy editors endlessly debating the merits of "theater" versus "theatre." ... "I love this site. It's better than the Kool-Aid acid tests." ..."I'm awed at the efficiency with which matters of opinion get hashed out in this forum." ... "Phil is the bomb!" ... "I'd wager that it's exactly your sort of hidebound thinking that contributes to the problems newspapers are having attracting readers." ... "I'm totally obsessed with this site. It's like porn--if you get off on Scrabble." ... "It reveals the backstage carping and vindictive emotions that roil the souls of those trapped at the copy desks." "When they say "testy," they certainly mean it. Whether it's reporters, editors, or the general public, no one is above their savage snark." ... "An apparent crack in the thin grey line." ..."Testy Copy Editors is a bitchboard for journalism's underclass." ... "My desire to read 'Testy Copy Editors' is only rivalled by my desire to pop "Constipated Call Girls" in the DVD player." ... "Phillip Blanchard is not just a testy copy editor, but a prophet scorned in his own time, and those of us who defend wordplay will be punished for it come the Judgment Day." ... "Phil Blanchard is as dashing in person as he is at the TCE board." ... "As far as writing and editing go: Read this board, read Bill Walsh, memorize the style book, read William Zinsser, and read the New York Times. That's a good start." ... "You should let go of your bitterness. You were not the oppressed talent you thought yourself to be. You were a miserable, brooding, silent, joyless grind, lucky to have a job at the Sun-Times, and we're lucky now that you've moved on to afflict others."

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