The tragedy of public lives and private grief

Perhaps, if journalists went back to the good old days of reporting news, not judging it and weighing it, we would not be so titillated by those in the public eye.
Then there are those who create the news:

Sun News Citizenship Ceremony: Federal Bureaucrats Pose As 'New Canadians' On Broadcast

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2012/02/02/...

By Jennifer Ditchburn, The Canadian Press — OTTAWA - Six federal bureaucrats were drafted to pose as new Canadians for a citizenship reaffirmation ceremony broadcast on the Sun News network, an event requested by Immigration Minister Jason Kenney's office.The bureaucrats smiled and held Canadian fla…

Perhaps journalists need to refrain from speculating on causes of death.
Perhaps journalists need to present facts, not opinions.
Don't tell me what to think, give me the information and let me know what to think about in the public eye.
Perhaps they need to refrain from public gossip, best left for private conversations.
Hand-in-hand with the false intimacy of television, is the media focus on how they cover news, not just the news.
Best meant for boardrooms, is the discussion on how journalists covered news items.
I depend upon family and friends, to discuss and debate politics, news, current events, tragedies, not journalists. So much harm can be done by speculation, rather than fold hard facts.
It is true in research that once you measure and assess that which you weigh, you change it.
I would rather have a lively discussion with friends, not read the opinions of journalists.
From reporting the news, they are making the news. No one can be objective, yet you can present a story less imbued with gems of flowery adjectives, more with data and information.

CBC.ca

1. The tragedy of public lives and private grief
   

   
   

   Ottawa Citizen‎ - 1 hour ago

   But it possibly makes life that much more excruciating for Carol Anne Meehan, the television news co-anchor who just lost her husband, Greg Etue. (All of these questions, by the way, came up at a family gathering on the weekend. It is not to gossip; but to make sense of the world.)
   
   
   
   

news vs. editorials

It never ceases to amaze me. What are they teaching in journalism school?

In an already horrific news item, graphically gruesome in its sparse details, it seems that journalists want to appear as writers. I began reading a news item, looking for facts. Instead, what I find is a creative rendition of what the journalist imagines happened when a mother murders her daughter. The statement of facts, which used to be what news articles were all about, were posted on another web page.

Whatever happened to the newspaper article guidelines of the past? You used to be able to read much of the item, salient details, in the first paragraph. It if was a more complicated story, more information was left to the next paragraph. Eventually, the writer left more of the less important detail, quotes from observers or victims.

I know, when I taught writing in elementary and middle school, that we guided students to include the formula: the who, what, when, where and why first. Most editors seem to need to include a hook or a pun in the title to grab the reader. Rather an insult to the reader, as if news isn't enough reason to read. That is why I pick up a paper or surf on-line papers.

Perhaps, in an attempt to 'jump the shark' in the print media, newspapers are attempting to grab readers. Magazine readership is down, you can order cheap magazines as they attempt to keep up subscribers lists and, therefore, advertising dollars. The industry is certainly facing many issues with readership in decline over the Internet. With an aging population with grace and dignity, perhaps it is time to determine target audiences and aim for real news and facts not fiction.

It is appalling the tabloid-type stories featured on the front page of the newspaper. What are they thinking? With the opening paragraph giving invented salacious prose, that leave out details. The reporter even speaks of the perpetrator speaking to an 'undercover agent' out in the field. If they are undercover, isn't that entrapment? I am so fed up with such headliner news. Give me facts and detail and information on a story, not something better suited to short story writers. These journalists have to get their mandate straight, editors have to get back on board. We cannot reduce the newspaper to junk copy.