(08-06-2022 06:58 PM)BatesUAB Wrote: I will not click on a link to that garbage website. Don't know why y'all do...
I'll spare you the pain with a summary: it's a bundle of gibberish and innuendo. Here's a little of it:
The mishandling of sexual assault allegations is a disturbing pattern in higher education. For those reasons alone, this latest lawsuit involving a former student at UAB demands full attention.
Okay, we start with a two-sentence lede, which they teach you in Newswriting 101 is one of those rookie mistakes you never, ever commit. Both of these sentences are also passive structures, which is another mark of a weak writer. This is unacceptable rubbish which should have been re-written by the copy desk, except that Advance Media laid all of them off long ago.
It cannot be ignored.
Oooh, a separate graf for this! Pretentious, much?
Truth to power is what we say in journalism. Justice, we like to believe, is what protects the weak from abuse. When it comes to collegiate athletics, though, there is an inconvenient truth. The apparatus is often considered too big to fail. We’ve seen it at Penn State, Florida State, Baylor, Michigan State … the list goes on. It is a plague spread by an easily corruptible system.
Actually, Joe ('cause I know you read this board), that first sentence is a "sentence fragment," as we say in journalism. The actual phrase is "To speak truth to power," and that's not the issue here. No one is speaking truth to power. The issue is that power is refusing to speak truth. Not the same thing. A weighty issue, to be sure, but it seems to escape Joe's understanding.
The rest of this pretentious drivel . . . good Lord.
Every sentence is built around a worn-out cliché.
Now, why does Joe's weak-to-nonexistent grasp of written English matter? I'll tell you why, because I'm on a roll now. First off, "he's arguing," as Counselor Bates would say, "from facts that are not in evidence." And they're not in evidence because he just couldn't get them, and so he's instead written a laundry list of excuses for his abject failure (waah! Fumbles won't talk to me!). He spoke to the plaintiff's attorney and got . . . nothing. He went through University Relations and they wouldn't arrange interviews for him. Waah!
Here's a hint, Joe: call them yourself. Show up at Ingram's damned office. Make him throw you out if he's not going to talk. (Why do you do this, Joe, instead of emailing or texting or IM'ing? Because there's no delete button at the door to Bartow West.) Do the same for Watts, UAB PD and everyone else you wanted spoon-fed to you. In other words,
do your damned job. Pull the police report; they're not allowed to deny you (neither are they required to help you find it, but that's your problem). That will have the officers' names. Talk to them.
Now, why does this matter?
Because this is a tremendously serious issue. We here at Blazertalk know that UAB's administration, and the Trustees who oversee them, lie as easily as they breathe. We experienced this first hand.
Something happened to Jane Doe. Something really bad. This cannot, must not be covered up and spoken of by hint and innuendo. But that's probably what's going to happen.
This is sad evidence of what happens when local journalism is destroyed by corporate greed. No one is left to ask the hard questions.
I noticed today that Golden Rule in Irondale is hiring busboys, Joe. You should call them. Or ask their PR department to put you in touch. Or maybe ask Ivana to lend you her brass balls for an afternoon.
Quote:This is a hit piece against the football team the way Joe wrote this, 100%.
It comes across that way thanks to Joe's laziness and lack of ability. But he more likely wrote it this way because he's incapable of the hard work of telling the actual story.
And that, my brothers and sisters, is all I have to say about that.
/
Yikes.
