Question on high school coverage...

You go Rosie!
BadgerBeer, have you considered NOT doing any high school favors?
Think it might be best for all.

 

You have no way to prove who you work for? No ID, no business card, nothing? I would think that at some point you would have had to show some work ID in order to pick up credentials for a game or just to get into your TV station, or wherever it is you work. Get yourself an ID and save yourself a lot of stress.

 

Come on guys! I never carry a special press pass for preps sports. Covering pro sports, that's different. Even college games are a different story. I've kept all of the season credentials from pro teams that I've earned in my career. But I'll be damned if I let the "Gate Nazi" at a preps game hastle me on a game that I don't want to even be at.

 

You don't need a special press pass, just something that says you're not somebody's dad with a camcorder or tape recorder. I don't see how you could be in this biz very long without ever having to prove that you're working media.

 

Wow, tell that to the paper I work for. A year on this new job, still no business card.

 

Then, standing there without identification, you don't have to go in.

Re-read Rosie's post. They're not doing this JUST to be pricks. The money is used by the school.

And while we're at it, let's examine Badger's original question: Are there really fairly well dressed 44 year old men that spend their Saturday afternoons trying to sneak into high school football games in order to save 3 fucking dollars?

Answer: No. Most fairly well dressed 44 year old men don't make a big thing about it, shell out the $3 (300 pennies), and get reimbursed by your employer if it's going to keep food off your table this week.

Check.

Checkmate.

 

Gate Nazis and power-tripping administrators at prep football games are ridiculous.

Two Fridays ago, I had no problem getting in the gate with the section-issued press pass we always use. When I tried walking through the next gate that separates the bleachers from the track, this guy asks me who I am and if I have photo identification. I said no, we always just use the section-issued pass and it's never a problem. He proceeded to speak very dismissively, and eventually asked for my editor's name and number, which I gladly provided, praying he would actually call. I further tried to explain to this guy that my paper hasn't issued photo IDs in about a decade, and that I'm not sure why the section pass works everywhere else but not at this school.

"Journalism is changing, we having tighter security and if I ask your paper to issue you a photo ID, they WILL do it, even though you're probably just an intern. If you stay in journalism, you'll learn about how it is changing."

Rather than break his nose, explain my actual employment situation or take my shoes off and all the metal out of my pockets as a joke, I just walked to the sideline.

There hasn't been a shooting at the school recently. I'm really not sure why they feel security is so much more important there. The thing that really pissed me off is that he hassled me on Homecoming night, when no less than 100 students representing each class performed on-field skits at halftime.

And I'm sure they all had photo IDs that were checked to make sure all the names and faces matched. :

The dick never called, and it's too bad because the editor wanted to tell him to fuck off more than I did.

 

I had to cover a recent political event. It had six senators, the governor and just about every state elected official. I went to walk into the the capitol and one of the state cops stops me.
I hold up my notebook and say I work for the paper and he lets me in. No credentials, just a dude by himself wearing slacks and a collared shirt. My paper doesn't even do photo IDs.
In the last six months, I've interviewed John McCain, Barack Obama, the current govenor, and on and on it goes and never asked for a credential either.
Maybe its just where I have live and work, but no one seems to be very high-strung. Or, maybe, its just confidence.

 

I agree with most responses here.

First of all BadgerBeer or whatever he's calling himself should be a little more respectful to the high school gate nazis. A little kindness goes a long way. While Badger didn't want to be at the game, the gate person might have been some low level school district employee, probably a custodian, making a little overtime by working the gate, or could be a volunteer booster club member or something.

It's also probably the case this gate nazi would rather be at home watching the Badgers get the shit beat outta them by Northwestern or whoever the hell they were playing that day.

Also, as others pointed out, schools shell out a lot of money for security since little Johnny likes to come onto campus packing heat and blowing the smithereens outta his classmates and teachers. And here recently, some wacko, unemployed drifters started kidnapping high school girls, raping them and then murdering them. So school district employees all over the country are a little more vigilant, even for the crummy game between Hometown (9-0) and Podunk (2-7).

Secondly or thirdly, BadgerBeer, you made the choice to do the game. If you hate it so much, just quit. You aren't without any choices here.

 

I get really irate about this.

Without fail, at some point during the HS basketball playoff season, we'll have a reporter or a photographer come back without a program. And he/she will say, "Well, they wanted $4 for it, and they weren't going to give me one for free."

(Picture, if you will, their trembling lower lip somewhere around their belt.)

Jeeeeeeee-zus, it is FOUR BUCKS. I'm not so cold as to think $4 doesn't mean something to the lower end of the pay scale, but for god's sake, you're there to do a JOB, and if there's something in the way of keeping you from doing your job, you MAKE ... IT ... WORK. You don't stand there protesting your entitlement, and you don't refuse to purchase the tools of your trade for that night because "it's the principle of the thing."

Plop down the money and put it on your expense sheet. Or swallow the money hit. It ain't that tough.