Getting out ... just to get out

We get it. Your devotion to The Cause and willingness to suffer for your craft make you so soooooooooooooo much purer and better than the rest of us.

Your one trick is getting tiresome, pony.

 

It's no badge of honor to still be in the business.

It's not necessarily a badge of honor to have gotten out.

But I'd certainly rather be where I am, than where I was. Which should be the ideal in any career.

 

With a family to raise, it would have been selfish of me to stay in.

There can be a nobility to getting out, as well.

 

You and Doc have looked pretty silly in this thread. If this board was composed of people still in the business, it would be a drab place. When posters like Doc and you, who really don't contribute much here in terms of posting, critcize those who do post, shouldn't you rethink your stance?

 

I contribute plenty assface. Look around and you might notice once in a while.

But when someone attacks the profession I love and have done for nearly 30 years, well you can kiss my fucking ass. I don't owe you shit. Take your jaded, bitter, worn out piece of shit ass, and move on with your life. This website is for people who enjoy sports journalism, not asswipe hypocrites that wish they were still in it but too damn proud to admit it.

If you had any fucking decency, you wouldn't be here. Your presence alone is an overstatement for how great this profession really is. I love my job. I hope that I never endure losing it like so many have. If and when that day comes, I'll be sick to start a new chapter in my life outside of sports journalism.

No, I'm not pure and all that other shit. I'm just not a fucking liar and a hypocrite. Now, again, fuck off junior.

 

Fuck off, doucher.

 

I didn't get out for noble reasons... Like most of us, I didn't have any choice in the matter.

My decision, which was clearly in the best interest of my family, was staying out. I wasn't about to move them around the country for a job that could disappear very quickly.

 

If you're tired of reading about it... maybe don't click on a thread about getting out of journalism? I'm out, but I still love journalism and enjoy reading/posting on this board. There are some very insightful, entertaining people here.

 

For Doc Holliday and Gonna Buy Me A Dog, I'll try to answer The Question.

Former journalists who hang out here do so for several reasons.

Reason 1: For most people in newspapers, their work is, or eventually becomes, their life. The nature of it demands passion, commitment and a willingness to put it first, before practically anything else. It is not "just a job." In other words, is almost an addiction. And we all know that addictions are not easily cast off. This site feeds that need.

Reason 2: Journalists, for all their cynicism, often are, beneath the surface and even right out in the open for all to see, among the most intelligent, thoughtful, well-spoken, interesting, caring, empathetic, sympathic and passionate people most of us have ever met, or may ever meet. And we know that, enjoy that, and thrive on that -- and we seek it out -- because we are that way ourselves. This site feeds that need.

Reason 3: Many of us did not leave of our own volition, and, despite any success we have been able to find outside of the business, we are either still grieving a very real loss, or, we have grieved it, and are, unfortunately, feeling part of "a club" that we know is still growing and that we can relate to, and perhaps, be of help. Certainly, we're lamenting the loss of something we once loved and may perhaps still love, even depite everything. That's how love is. Sometimes, you just do, and there's not really much explanation for it. This site keeps us close and feeds that need for support and interaction with those whom we might not have been totally ready to leave behind just yet.

Now for my specific thoughts on what keeps me, in particular, here: This is one of the best places on the internet for discussion of things that are of interest to me, with people who are of interest to me. Take it as a compliment that people stay on past the time when they may be directly involved anymore. Some of us may hate what journalism seems to be becoming, but most of us don't hate journalism, never have, and never will. What you're reading here is not hate or disdain for the business; it is perspective, gained the only way you can get it -- by stepping away, and seeing and comparing.

And while the writing/craft discussions are certainly among the professionally pertinant parts of this site, if that was all there was to it, SportsJournalists.com would, frankly, be a boring place that would probably lose instead of keep most of its members.

When it comes right down it, it's the people and their passions and their stories that make this site go -- not the writing about writing.

 

I'm glad I stuck it out in the biz (27 years so far) and hope that I never get to the point where I would come on a board like this and say I don't miss it.

That said, I don't plan to be a "lifer" just because our time here is short and I do want some other experiences, so I understand the viewpoint of those now living another kind of life.

Good luck to all on both sides of the fence.

 

On No. 1: Many have tried to deny that here in the past. They were incorrect. Many jobs do become you life, daily sports journalism included.

I disagree with No. 2, just because people of all professions can display those personality traits.

No. 3 is a little too existential for me.

I enjoy some of the personalities that manifest themselves here, and I find amusement when those who take things way too seriously are told to chill the heck out. I return here because I like to discuss things at a place that isn't full of fanboys who shout down any kind of criticism of heroes. If I post on a site for my alma mater, or a band I like, I can expect to not have any kind of nuanced discussion. Here, many views are represented, from the intelligent to the vile.

Really, the only kind of criticism that gets shouted down here is when it is perceived that proper respect has not been paid to a longform sports writer.

 

Hey Doc, you might love the business but it will NEVER love you back.

I assumed everyone in newspapers for more than a year -- to say nothing of 30-plus -- already had that figured out. Guess not.