Thursday, August 28, 2008

I'm Not the Man I Once Was

Back in the day, I would have preened if I'd done such a story. But now it seems just a little mean. Of course, more often than not such a story is adored by its subjects.

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Waffle House Wedding

www.gwinnettdailypost.com/ftp/multimedia/waffleweddingx/publish_to_web/ - 2k - Cached - Similar pages - Note this


Oh, it was my sis in Tinasee who sent the link. She's a good old girl, but not quite this good.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

This was just plain mean and ugly. Shame on you, professor.

....J.Michael Robertson said...

When I was doing word-sausage for a living, I'd have done such a story with gusto. Now, I'm filled with the kindness that comes from having a regular paycheck that does not originate in a news organization.

(Better not boast too much about what a hardass I once was. Buy me a drink, and I'll tell you about a wedding story I did in which I wimped out.)

The interesting question, of course, is if, indeed, you object to the pictures, then *which* pictures?

....J.Michael Robertson said...

By the way, "anonymous" use to rip the guts out of the people he interviewed, drape them about him and then twirl in front of a mirror like the killer in 'Silence of the Lambs.'

He was much admired, even beloved.

Anonymous said...

Michael,

I watched the video...what's the ethics issue that I missed?

A Concerned Journalist

....J.Michael Robertson said...

Ah, spoken like a true journalist!! Fat people are fat – nothing we can do about that. I’m thinking that maybe the photos of them smoking *might* have been eliminated, plus the one of the rumpled lower halves of the groomsmen, given the fact that some folk will look at this series and think: fat stupid rednecks. But even as I write that sentence, I know I wouldn’t have cut a photo, though I guess that knowing how some viewers will react might have caused me to *think* about trimming a few photos. But of the course the answer to such fastidiousness is simple. This is what the people looked like and how they behaved, plus these were their voices. And I must also acknowledge that in Gwinnett County just north of Atlanta many folk are like these folk and might not get – or if they get, care about it – if the snobs look down.



An irony is that one of my primary complaints about USF journalism students is that they are so damn nice they are unlikely to ever get any kind of decent story. I’d rather crank down meanness than try to instill it.