Radio, newspaper, and my ethics

I don't know about you, but I've had to talk to the parents and friends of kids who just passed away, as well as people battling catastrophic injuries and illnesses, people who have been just been arrested and charged with various crimes and a guy who had spent the past dozen or so years in and out of jail for drug and sexual offenses. And, yes, all occurred in my role as a sports reporter.

Just sayin'.

 

He has total autonomy. Not an employee. Key words, for me. I don't have a problem with Canzano doing this show, nor do I have an issue with anyone else who negotiated similar details to insulate himself. Sorry, but this ain't complicated for me.

ps... I think Canzano would be the first to agree that sports is important stuff.

 

I say again, it's not always easy. But those tragic individual stories do not have great significance for society as a whole. They are also not the bread and butter for a typical sportswriter.

The people who are writing about cancer cures, the prevalence of rape, etc. on a regular basis are writing about the societally significant stuff.

There are exceptions, especially in Sports Illustrated, for example. The China story cited earlier in this thread is one. The Katrina recovery story by Alex Wolff I linked to in another thread would qualify too. A lot of stuff by Gary Smith. But those are exceptions.

Look, I like sports. Probably more than most people on this board. But I won't overdramatize their significance. They are relatively unimportant--and mostly fun--hence the "toy department" label.

 

Perhaps it would help if you read what I wrote.

 

I'm not going to argue that my game story is as important as war coverage or coverage of the elections or anything like that, but to dismiss sports as "unimportant" is ignorant...

It's important to the readers and I'm going to guess that a lot of them reach for the sports page before they read 1A.

I guarantee you our sports columnist gets more email in a week than our entire newsside staff combined... I guess what he writes much be pretty unimportant to the readers...

 

Jack, this is simply silly.

Stories are important. All kinds of stories. If only because stories, well told, help us uncover some kind of shared human experience.

But to think you can find a dividing line in which stories are "important" by their placement in the daily newspaper is the worst kind of grade-school thinking.

I'll take Wright Thompson's story about his dad at Masters time over any City Council story I've ever read, and I'm the person on here who constantly has to remind people that City Council stories are important.

 

One might argue that Wright Thompson's story about his dad and the Masters is a sports story in roughly the same sense that "Chariots of Fire" is a sports movie. Sports is the backdrop for a story that crosses a lot of boundaries and eludes simplistic definitions.

 

My point exactly.

Good stories are about people, and you can find them in the sports section just as easily as in the metro section.

Toy department, my ass.

 

Unfortunately, those stories are the exception, not the rule. Too many sports sections are content to let themselves be thought of as toy departments, even as they bristle at the term. Whether because of budget cuts, insufficient personnel or lack of know-how, most papers don't have enough stories that go outside the lines.

On that point I'd bet you and Jack would find common ground.

 

You're one hundred percent correct.

Of course, those stories are the exception, not the rule, in all newspaper sections.

 

And the choir sings, "Amen."

 

The mass has ended, go in peace.