Why I Quit My Dream Newspaper Job After 4 Months

To each his own as far as that goes.

However, I can't stand people who crate their dogs for that long, or longer, every day.

 

I don't know if I knew any dog walkers until I moved to NYC. Growing up, people left their dogs at home while they went to work. Whether they lived in town or in the country (and worked in town and didn't farm). There are a lot people in this country who would probably be surprised to learn they shouldn't have dogs because that's how they live.

Anyway, with the generational thing, I don't mind millennials being targets -- and participate sometimes myself -- because that is the way things have always been. Older generations complain about younger. But that goes the other way too: If millennials are off-limits, then they also shouldn't be allowed to bitch about Baby Boomers or make sweeping generalizations about them. But they can. That's the cycle of life. I agree with Golden Age Syndrome, but the partner of that is the Everything Is Better Now argument. Thankfully, I usually only engage in this when it comes to Lakers messageboards, where there are countless fans who refuse to believe the Showtime Lakers could compete in today's NBA. Because they're old. And three-pointers. Idiot youth...

As for the article, thought it was ridiculous, for many of the reasons already posted. And also made me think of this:
The first-person industrial complex: How the harrowing personal essay took over the Internet.

 

Had a conversation recently with my sister-in-law. She says she's thinking of quitting her job, which she likes for the most part. We ask why. She says her son is having a difficult time in kindergarten, because it is not as familiar and nurturing as his preschool. She's thinking of homeschooling him. They're upper middle class, and the dad (my brother-in-law) works long hours, usually six days a week. We were flabbergasted.

It's been interesting to see 20 years of this kind of parenting mentality — if life is hard on your kid, rescue them, partly to alleviate your own parenting guilt — come home to roost in college kids. Having never learned how to overcome difficult situations or endure something that's not ideal, quitting becomes the default choice when the sea gets a little rough. Then adulthood comes along and there is no one there to rescue you. A student I was advising turned in a draft of a humor piece she'd written last week. It wasn't particularly funny or creative, so I talked with her a bit, showed her some examples of writing I thought she could read to punch it up. Said I appreciated the attempt, but if she wanted to publish it in the school paper, I thought it needed a bit more ambition. She said she'd try over the weekend, then quit instead.

I don't know that this mentality is exclusive to 20-somethings. I do, however, think there is an entire genre of websites willing to let you cast your own failures as an indictment of "old media." Let's be real here: If someone my age wrote an essay about quitting Gawker after four months because the culture was too entrenched in its own narcissism, Gawker would be merciless in mocking it.

People have always had frustrations with work. They just vented about them at the bar instead of publishing them in an attempt to recast their flaky behavior as an act of stay-true-to-thyself bravery.

 

But that's different, though, right, than letting the dog have the run of the place while you're gone?

 

Yeah it definitely is. We only crated dogs when they were pups and someone would come home once or twice a day to check in. Once they are out of the crate, pretty much all the dog will do is sleep on the sofa. Maybe order a porn or two.

 

Read this yesterday after a long, long afternoon/night at work; had a good laugh over it, and knew there would be an SJ.com thread. I'm not disappointed.

I heartily agree with everyone who's noted how horrible newspapers are at hiring/grooming management. In my career, newsroom managers are mostly in these two categories:

1. Career "newspaperman" (yes, usually a guy) who was a great reporter or copy editor, and stuck around long enough to move into management. Great journalists usually don't make great managers.

2. Outsider brought in to "shake things up." Used to be these folks were hellfire and brimstone, work at any time for as much time as I want you to, or I'll bring my own people. I guess these days they're 20-somethings like the essay's author, Devon Maloney, who convince clueless HR people they can make old-school newspapers into social media-friendly hipster hangouts.

 

For the record, I do have some sympathy for Ms. Maloney. She's not wrong about us 40-something dudes who work at newspapers; we're resistant to change and (many of us) hanging on for dear life to the paycheck. We also know we'll be there long after the new flavor-of-the-month manager and/or trendy reorganization plan is gone.

I was a freelancer my first year out of college, too. I worked a second job at Taco Bell and covered news meetings, sports and whatever features I could peddle for several daily and weekly publications in suburban Chicago.

I would hope in this day and age of endless online chatter and content, it would be easier to exist as a freelance journalist, but my guess is the pay and financial situation is even worse today than 20 years ago.

 

You're absolutely right, Dick, but it's not like they're rolling out a new model of human every generation or so. It's about the environment people grow up in. Pull a member of the Greatest Generation off of Omaha Beach and stick him in modern times and he'll be hashtagging and creating memes within a month.

 

The freelance budget is the first thing to go. Well, second, after the travel budget.

 

Except this bitch was the one harping about the older guys she had to manage. Then she revealed herself as being someone who is emotionally unstable/fragile and possibly in need of psych meds. Don't think I mentioned "millenials" was just looking at this individual. Maybe the technology is a sign of the times though. Millenials only know instant information/gratification so that has an effect on their thinking. But still not sure why you would want to put everything out there. If you're hiring and everything is equal, but one person reveals they are emotionally unstable wouldn't that tip the scales?

 

Millennials (and as one, I think I'm more than qualified to say this) tend to think everyone cares about their inner-workings — so much so that they think people want to read 2,000 words about why they quit their job. There are some things best left under wraps. It would seem to me this is one, should she ever decide to want to be in the industry again. Torched quite a few professional bridges here. And for what? To tell a story that's not even particularly unique?

 

Not to millennials, or to the large subset of millennials who believe (over)sharing is caring.

EDIT: What k8m4