A column to make you cringe

Every journalism school in North America should use this as Bad Example 1-A.

 

i hold no ill will for the guy. it's obvious he didn't know what the hell he was doing ... and that's not his fault.

 

if you're in the biz, don't you at least have to make it a point to become familiar with basic ethics? obviously he's not getting any direction from above, but I'm not going to totally let him off the hook. some things you should just know

 

Dear Diary,

Today I took my 4-year-old son to see a naked man in a locker room. He was thrilled!!

 

HAHAHA -- The kid has a play iron!!

 

Thing is, most of the small-town rip jobs that pop up here from time to time are along the lines of someone from the Daily Bugle posting a bad lead from a prep field hockey gamer written by an obviously inexperienced stringer over at the Weekly Fishwrap. That comes off mean-spirited. This one comes off like it was written by someone who should know better, and shouldn't be immune from criticism.

 

No shit. That kid must have the gay.

 

If I were to accept tickets and not pay for them, I would be fired immediately.
Our sweat shop has a very strict policy. The items are collected and given to the under-privileged. I think it's a good policy.
Every time I see that FedEx box, I ask myself if it worth my job. Plus, someone else could probaby use that 19th Hole golf t-shirt more than I.

(fixed spelling)

 

But what if you went out of your way to solicit the tickets and a trip to the locker room for your family. Wouldn't that be OK as long as you wrote about it?

 

I can't believe this is even true. I can't fathom it. From Genesis to revelation, my jaw was open.
I even read a couple paragraphs twice, to be sure I was grasping the entire scope.

 

One of the first questions people ask me, of course, is whether I get free tickets to games. By saying no, I'm defining the objective, professional and, in some ways, higher-calling standard of what we do. Anyone drawing a paycheck should know this.

 

Ethics? Who gives a shit about ethics? I got into this biz for all the cool schwag! I love how I get free tickets to the Super Bowl and unlimited autographs, too.

Joking aside, I was more appalled by how poorly-written the column was. This is a small-timer somewhere in a small town. If that column hadn't been posted on this site, probably only about 12 people would have read it. Honestly, if you went back through, fixed the obvious grammatical errors and tossed in a few similes and mixed metaphors, it would read an awful lot like a Rick Reilly column. I remember one from a few years ago where he used his pull at SI to get an all-expense paid trip to the Bahamas (or some other exotic location) for him and his 15-year-old son so they could ogle the hot girls while Walter Iooss shot a Swimsuit Issue cover. Yeah, that's ethical.

And every year we give that fucking douche a Sportswriter of the Year Award. No wonder clowns like Bill Potrecz think it's OK to accept free tickets and gifts from players.