Cursing in the newsroom

[Tom Petty]

Funny this should come up now.
In my newsroom, not only is cursing not OK, any sort of loudness is not allowed.
Last week, all four of the sports people were told by the EIC that we had gotten so out of hand that some of the news reporters wouldn't come into the office at night on our account. I guess they complained it was a little too distracting. We were all threatened with being suspended for a day without pay if there were any further problems.

Since when are the forking news reporters in the gosh darn newsroom at night?

At our paper, election night. And they act like it's some big forking sacrifice. Then they complain when sports people start eating the pizza brought in to atone for this huge inconvenience.

First football Friday night, come in about four and buy the staff pizza at 5... when Newsside comes over, complain loudly

my shop takes individual orders for every person in the newsroom come election night ... basically, we all get our own pizzas. heck, this place has made me appreciate election night and those pussies in news bitching about working after sunset.

 

[MacDaddy]

The paper I recently left started integrating its copy desks into a universal desk around five years ago. I had moved on to a non-news department by then, but the guys in sports would pass along their war stories. Things leveled out as time passed -- the sports guys eased up a little bit, but the news guys got a tad more colorful and less restrained.

Our desk is allegedly universal (there are about three of us who get stuck covering shifts on other desks periodically) and the news people actually annoy us sports folks most of the time. It's not cursing; more along the lines of an inability to turn cell phones ringers off, having loud personal phone conversations, laughing loudly at shirt that's not funny, etc.

 

[Bob Slydell]

Well, when our computers used to crash right at deadline, which they did at least twice a week, we would let loose a string of profanity that would make The Old Man from a Christmas Story blush.

It was our true medium!

And I put a reall nice dent in my desk drawrer from a huge kick when cursing just wasn't enough.

Funny though, I seem to curse less at my new paper. Maybe because I'm in during the day more and night shift people seem to curse more.

 

[tyler durden 71351]

Back at my first gig, the court reporter was a crusty son-of-a-bench. One day, some crazy woman calls him and keeps him on the line for 30-40 minutes, telling him her tale of woe. The guy hangs up the phone and yells "fork!" at the top of his lungs. Then he turns to a metro editor who used to cover courts and shouts "Hey Burns, want your forking job back?" Everyone in the newsroom cracks up...the problem was, they just had some dividers between news and advertising, no walls. And the advertising folks didn't like all that language...so we all got a lecture about proper workplace conversations.
Oh, and as far as newsroom cursing stories go, Jesus_Muscatel has a bunch of them...one time he was so pissed, one of the copy editors said he started making up curse words.

 

[KG]

I think my language is worse here on this board than anywhere else. I make valid attempts at pulling my sweet card out most of the time, but it doesn't always work.

 

[Angola!]

I think my language is worse here on this board than anywhere else. I make valid attempts at pulling my sweet card out most of the time, but it doesn't always work.

I cuss more on here than I do at work also, though it's not because I pull out a "sweet card." More because people in my department aren't obnoxiously loud and I don't do pages at this shop, so I don't have to worry about my computer crashing on deadline.
If I am on the road and I have problems with connecting to the internet, though, I will melt down. I did it once in a hotel lobby and got a lot of strange stares from hotel guests and the workers.

 

[Claws for Concern]

Had a co-worker who, when he left to go get his dinner, everyone in the sports department put in money and guess how many times he'd cuss in one hour's time (without goading him to cuss). I won the pool with 63 cuss words. A total guess on my part, but one of the few times when it paid to cuss!

 

[KG]

I cuss more on here than I do at work also, though it's not because I pull out a "sweet card." More because people in my department aren't obnoxiously loud and I don't do pages at this shop, so I don't have to worry about my computer crashing on deadline.
If I am on the road and I have problems with connecting to the internet, though, I will melt down. I did it once in a hotel lobby and got a lot of strange stares from hotel guests and the workers.

Well one guy in my office walks so heavy that I've even heard him referred to as a running bull. And he's back and forth, back and forth.

I'm in the front section of the office, so it catches more traffic. People will actually stop right behind me and talk on their phones...loudly.

God forbid if I ever need to make a business-related call while I'm at work. It's so loud there sometimes that when actually on the phone, I've had people ask, "What on earth is going on there?" Then it's usually followed up by questions about why are they talking so loudly so close to my desk. Well because they are still there (one of them is often my boss) my answer has to be (with a smiling voice) "Oh, I don't know." I usually follow it up with a forced giggle that I pull off quite well.

I don't want to start letting the words fly there, because I don't want to end up looking like the guy in the office that's overdoing the steriods and flying off the handle without notice.

I really do try to keep it clean most of the time anyway though. Recently in college, a few of my classmates were completely stunned to learn that I like rock and some metal music. They thought I was too sweet and mellow or something. I thought I wore my heart on my sleeve but apparently I was wrong.

I think it's all the forking bad influences here turning me into a potty mouth.

 

[pallister]

I wear my heart on my sleeve, and it tends to get pretty upset at various points every shift.

 

[Tom Petty]

I cuss more on here than I do at work also, though it's not because I pull out a "sweet card." More because people in my department aren't obnoxiously loud and I don't do pages at this shop, so I don't have to worry about my computer crashing on deadline.
If I am on the road and I have problems with connecting to the internet, though, I will melt down. I did it once in a hotel lobby and got a lot of strange stares from hotel guests and the workers.

I think it's all the forking bad influences here turning me into a potty mouth.

i think moddy should do away with all those sonsabitches.

 

[Oz]

Cussing is forking encouraged here, but nobody drops the forking F-bombs like I do.

Especially when Lew Ford comes to bat with the bases loaded against the Royals.

 

[Tom Petty]

I wear my heart on my sleeve, and it tends to get pretty upset at various points every shift.

three words used as one: cork-forking-sucker. that's when my "guys" know i'm actually pissed and not just being a jagoff. photogs, puter freezes, coaches/sids and corporate usually account for 98.7 percent of my use of cork-forking-suckers.