The Truth

I wrote a blog about a text conversation I had with the funniest person I've ever met. I'm a typical cynical sports writer, so you can imagine it was pretty good. Basically, it was one long joke that Internet Trolls misunderstood. They trashed me and my shop.

Long story short, my publisher took down the blog (getting censored is a separate rant I'm afraid to start for the fear I may never stop) because he didn't want people saying bad things about me or our paper (I really could not care less what people say about me).

I responded to one particular Troll, who sent me an e-mail that began "You are a moron," and told him that he misunderstood my blog, that it wasn't a news story; it was a blog. Just two friends ribbing each other. He e-mailed me back and said, "No, it was a news story."

Pause for a minute to grasp that concept from all its angles.

Because in a day and age where ESPN airs segments called Cold Hard Facts that have nothing but opinions, people literally don't know the difference between news and opinion. They think Stephen A. Smith yelling at them about who is going to win the next NBA series is news.

So I wrote a column explaining the difference between news and blogs, explaining how they're different worlds, blah, blah, blah.

STILL, I got an e-mail from someone who had been following this closely, and he told me my blog was news. So not only are non-journalists telling me, a journalist, what is and what isn't news, I'm telling people what my intentions were, and they're telling me, "No, this was your intention."

My fear is that I fell asleep 10 years ago and woke up in a society that no longer understands, or really seems to care about, what the truth is. And to me, the potential ramifications of that are enough to try and land a job teaching English in a foreign country.

Love to hear some thoughts

 

You are a moron.

 

I saw the Cumdumpsters open for Aerosmith and Winger back in the day.

Great show.

 

My uncle drove a Cumdumpster.

 

It's always good to keep in mind that the instant you have written something, anything, and have put it out for public consumption, your control over what it means has ended - the writer is not the dictator of meaning - that is for the readers to decide. You can disagree with their conclusions but you can't dispute them. If they come to a conclusion you disagree with, it may be because they're stupid, but it may also be because you have not written clearly enough to lead them to the conslusion you intended.

 

my uncle was driven by a cumdumpster.

 

Yeah, nobody saw that one coming.
Long fly, deep left field...

 

Editorhoo: I share your fear. The team I cover has a website that posts all the stories written about the team from various papers, and allows viewers to comment. At least three-fourths of the comments betray no capacity for rational thought, let alone the capacity to discern fact from opinion.
But I do get e-mails from actual thinking, noninsane people, here and there. Those keep me going, however pathetic that might sound.

 

Buzz Bissinger thinks you're full of shit.

 

Reading comprehension is pitifully poor in this country. People will read something and come to the complete opposite conclusion than what is implied. It's scary.

The news/opinion distinction is way, way over their heads. They read facts that disagree with their own outlook as opinion, and opinion that agrees with theirs as "fact." With the spin some beat writers put on, maybe they're not completely wrong. But I digress.

 

People have always been idiots. It's just easier for them to communicate with us now thanks to the internet.

If it helps any, one expression can help get you through the day -- Suffer Fools Gladly.

And remember, if you don't, they win.

 

In theory (and I don't agree with it), my news director says the working definition of news is "new information" so even a blog would be considered "news" to some people if it's new to others.

Again, I don't agree with that definition, but he says it's the widespread definition of news.