"It was taken out of context."

Caught a blurb on the local news about the latest celebrity controversy ), as Jennifer Aniston apparently backtracks on talking shit about Angelina Jolie.

The short story: Aniston told Vogue that Angelina stealing Brad Pitt was, "so uncool" (boy, she really must have loved Brad to summon that kind of anger). Now she says the quote was "taken out of context."

That, of course, is bullshit, but it is being reported now, much the way it is reported every time some athlete, coach, celebrity or politician says something stupid and they know they can't take it back completely. So, instead of standing by their statements, they always say, "it was taken out of context" and "I can't believe Podunk Press would do that" (in Aniston's case it was, "I can't believe Vogue would go so tabloid").

So my problem, I guess is, how come reporters never ask the obvious follow-up - "How was it taken out of context? What did you originally say?" Instead, we just let them say it was taken out of context and blame the media for their stupidity, and then - and here's the kicker - we report it!

No wonder the public doesn't believe in us anymore. Every time a famous person says we took a quote out of context, we tell the public that we fucked up, even when 98 percent of the time, we didn't. We do enough fucking up on our own. It's time we stop letting famous people act like we're the ones who fucked up when they couldn't keep their mouths shut.

 

Fixed.

 

Totally agree. This should be like preaching to the choir, but then again, the reporters are the ones doing it, huh?

 

Hey, quit taking my quotes out of context, fucker!

 

How was your quote taken out of context?

 

Well, I guess it was just taken completely out of existence. Not sure which is worse.

 

I dunno. I think I captured the relevant part of your post!

 

I assume that most of these "taken out of contest" responses are statements or releases in which the press is not given an opportunity to follow up.

 

Normally, I'd actually side with the celeb. But this is Vogue, not some tabloid.

 

I disagree ... I think you see plenty of them on ESPN highlights and such and the Aniston one, in particular, was given during an interview with Entertainment Weekly.

That's it, TSP, you're on the list. And you don't want to be on the list!

 

Unless you run a full transcript, all quotes are taken out of context.

Most athletes and celebrities don't even know what it means, they just use it as an excuse when someone calls them out on something they said.

I hate Jennifer Aniston with a passion, but I think calling someone "uncool" for stealing her husband is pretty tame.

 

Honest question, SG: are you a journalist?