Bullshit and laziness

I thought I read that all three were canned.

 

That would be the most appropriate response, especially given the copy editors' laziness.

 

It was clear no one proofed that story before it got to the final line. Lazy copy editors piss me off. I am told on a daily basis by three of them at my current post how much they hate sports, don't understand sports and how little respect they have for sports. I'm lucky to get them to proof my stuff, long or short. I do sympathize with the guy, but the mistake is unforgivable. One of the few things that was grilled into me in J-School and at my first post was "If you don't want to see it in print, don't type it. Ever." It's right along the same lines as broadcasting where you never swear or talk smack around a microphone because you never know if it is live. If he was in his early 30s this should not be a new lesson for him, it was careless and just plain stupid.

But it made my day on so many levels.

 

We've already shortened it to B&L in my office.

 

I really, really, really want to use this as an object lesson in my high school journalism class.

But unfortunately, the presence of a four-letter word will probably prevent that from happening. You know, not educationally-appropriate or something like that.

 

That has eight letters. You have more to fear from the math department.

 

Also, "educationally appropriate" is not hyphenated.

 

I've had a few B&L colleagues in my life. More in the Holy Hell category, though. As in they looked like it, and dragged in a few cats from there to boot.

 

The thing that I don't understand, is how inept this story actually was written, edited and published.

"...15 out 16 stolen base attempts ..."
"Outfielder Sidney Fontenot," simply ends with nothing.
"...and stole six out of six bases." is poorly written, but we won't harp on this one.

I also don't need to further elaborate on the fact that there is no mound in softball, since I brought that up in the other thread. (Still, dumbass)

I guess I could even overlook the lack of punctuation in the final and, um, infamous paragraph.

Even if the sports writer is just off the streets or fresh off a college newspaper, two proofreaders can't catch this shit? This is supposed to be a city newspaper, created by, um, professional journalists? (I didn't say professionally paid journalists, mind you)

Whomever hired these three dimwits should be considered for firing, too, though with newsroom budgets these days, warm bodies are filling many of these chairs anyway.

 

The story was garbage, no doubt about it. And he shouldn't have typed it. No matter how much venting made him feel better. It's all right to think it, but writing it down is a different matter.
He deserved to get fired. As do the people who looked at it as well. And not just for the "bullshit and laziness" bit.

 

Oh, it's obvious no one really read thing. Happens at some weeklies. I've seen "yams" misspelled, and that's pretty hard to do.

 

Same here. As we in the Army say, they looked like a hot mess.