Anger Your Readers
(Dec. 3, 2009) As a teenager I worked in a small deli my dad owned with my uncle. We served great food at good prices. That was all it took to make our customers happy. If someone complained that the potato salad had turned, dad gave him a fresh container or his money back.
It is more difficult to satisfy customers in the news business. When people express unhappiness, you can’t satisfy them by handing them back the quarters they spent on the newspaper that day. You can’t produce a smile with a fresh issue and a pickle.
A good reporter will cringe at widespread praise for a story; if everyone liked it, she did something wrong. Instead, she earns credibility when the story rankles, in different ways, just about everyone who reads it.
Last week I saw two forms of protest against newspapers in this area. Both are instructive. In the North Coast Journal, 10-year-old Ciara A. Cheli-Colando, wrote a letter to the editor to protest my take on public radio in my last column. I had suggested that KHSU should kill shows like A Prairie Home Companion, Thistle and Shamrock and folk music programs that cater to the gray and the bald, and instead turn over the mics to those with heads full of pink hair.
Ciara wanted to remind me that everyone counts. “The reason folk shows have been running on KHSU for 40 years is because people have been requesting them for 40 years,” she said. She also likes Thistle and Shamrock. So there.
Then my former student Jason Robo wrote to announce a boycott against the Arcata Eye for, among other things, bringing national attention to Arcata on the issue of marijuana and grow houses. He argues that Hoover and the Eye “threaten the existence of our local culture so by this logic his ‘newspaper’ should have no right to exist.”
For the record, I like protests. I like anti-war protests and teabag protests. I like when gay people protest against discrimination and homophobia and when preachers protest against gay people. Demonstrations of protest are the First Amendment in action.
Back in 1644, John Milton argued that censorship is short-sighted if you believe in the power of truth. He wrote: “… so Truth be in the field, we do injuriously by licensing and prohibiting to misdoubt her strength. Let her and Falsehood grapple; who ever knew Truth put to the worse in a free and open encounter? Her confuting is the best and surest suppressing.”
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on the cover
Railroad!
Proposed lines ‘set rich blood a-tingling’ in early 1900s
Some Other Proposed North Coast Railroads
Choo-choo Fantasies
Exposing this east-west rail nonsense
seven-o-heaven
Undeterred Will
Will chides Andrew for lack of attention to detail and makes plans for his inevitable victory.
Recent media maven
May 17
If You Tweet in a Forest
April 5
Not in My Court Yard
March 1
Take the Money and Run With It
Today
44th Annual Kinetic Grand Championship Race
STAFF PICK / events, art, outdoors, sports, for kids, free / 9 a.m.-6 p.m. A 3-day, 42-mile kinetic sculpture race over land, sand, mud and water! LeMans start at the Noon Whistle on the Arcata Plaza. Follow the race through Manila, Eureka and into Ferndale on Memorial Day for the Glorious Finish. kineticgrandchampionship.com. 889-3024.
Flow 2012 Fashion Show
STAFF PICK / events / 8 p.m. Arcata Theatre Lounge, 1036 G St. Student designed and produced clothing. Fundraiser for Arcata Arts Institute. $35/$25 students. artsinstitute.net. 822-1220.
Woodside Preschool's Rummage/Bake Sale
events / 8 a.m.-noon. Woodside Preschool, 900 Hodgson St, Eureka. www.woodsidepreschool.com. 445-9132.
Lanphere Dunes Restoration
STAFF PICK / outdoors / 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Meet at Pacific Union School. Help remove non-native invasives at the Lanphere Dunes Unit of the Humboldt Bay National Wildlife Refuge. Tools and gloves provided, wear work clothes and bring water. Carpool to the protected site. 444-1397.
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22 Comments
Comment / By unanonymous / Dec. 3, 2009, 9:10 a.m.
It appears the allegedly esteemed professor is confused between the reporting of news and editorializing. Maybe a refresher journalism course would help her.
Also, Ms. Burtiner appears to not understand that a boycott IS free speech, not a weapon. All Americans have the right to present their opinions to the public and if they chose, demonstrate (picket) against those they feel transgressed by for redress.
As for her dismissive treatment of a young persons opinion, Milton provides us with guidance in the same piece quoted:
“How many other things might be tolerated in peace and left to conscience, had we but charity, and were it not the chief stronghold of our hypocrisy to be ever judging one another! I fear yet this iron yoke of outward conformity hath left a slavish print upon our necks; the ghost of a linen decency yet haunts us.”
Read Milton,
http://www.stlawrenceinstitute.org/vol14mit.html
As he cautions, it appears the State, as represented by a state employee, wants robo to stop his free speech and a 10-year old to read what she is “forced to”. Very medieval of you professor.
Comment / By Hogwarts / Dec. 3, 2009, 10:07 a.m.
“By the way, Ciara, have I told you that I consider Harry Potter children’s trash?”
Excuse me! But what does that have to do with anything? She didn’t even mention anything about Harry Potter. She may not even like Harry Potter for all you know. Why would you ass u me all 10 year olds like this book? Obviously you’re a little riled by a 10 year old,s criticism of you. I’d say you’re overly defensive. And why would that be I wonder?
Comment / By me / Dec. 7, 2009, 7:57 p.m.
Did this author seriously quote Jason Robo? I just want to make sure I didnt imagine that. If people made a habit of writing refutations to Robo’s personal epithets, nothing would get accomplished in this town. There is simply not enough time in this life. Let some things slide.
Comment / By Arcatan / Dec. 8, 2009, 11:57 a.m.
Jason Robo is a pig and an idiot. I hope this all backfires on him and the Eye becomes massively successful.
Google Jason Robo: he’s a 9-11 conspiracy nut-job (surprised that he isn’t trying to blame Hoover for that too) who was arressted for causing a terrorist scare on an airplane not too long ago.
Comment / By Jason Robo / Dec. 10, 2009, 8 p.m.
Marcy, one of the best books I’ve read was Ben Bagdikian’s “Media Monopoly.” He successfully evaluates and predicted what we have today, media consolidated into the hands of few serving the interests of the few. We must reverse this trend, if we can’t do it locally then what help do we have? I’ve read some of Milton’s work, the phrase, Status quo ante, which translates to “the way things were before,” comes to mind.
As for saying the Eye has “no right” to exist I regret hastily wording the FB group description. I removed the wording shortly after. Most know that doesn’t align with my beliefs or actions. Fighting HSU’s Draconian “free speech” policies for instance.
Arcatan, your personal attacks lack content. A stewardess held up the flight, I got the reports after pleading not guilty seeking to go to trial. My charges were dismissed and a ton of debate on 9/11 resulted. I happily accept being the target of attacks rather than going along with the sheeple herd. Last night’s show Conspiracy Theory with Jesse Ventura focused on 9/11. Ventura, a former Navy Seal, specialized in demolitions. He was confused that those buildings fell into their own footprint not maximizing collateral damage, rather the collapse was indicative of controlled demolition which takes planning and computer controlled charges. The real smoking gun is WTC7, a building that wasn’t even hit by a plane that housed the CIA, FBI, Secret Service and the Securities and Exchange Commission (which investigated things such as Enron, Worldcom, etc…many documents were destroyed). If you believe everything the gvnt tells you, fine. Polls of Americans show that the “nut-job” side outnumbers your side.
NYT & CBS: 84% say 9/11 is a cover-up http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/October2006/141006poll.htm
Many dislike Hoover and his paper. Regardless of personal attacks on myself, by anonymous folk, there fails to be any argument against the threat his paper poses.
It’s good to be angry about certain issues, unfortunately your emotions are misdirected. Subconsciously I think many know something is wrong but refuse to reevaluate their understanding of the world. I close with this from Mark Twain:
“In religion and politics people’s beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing.”
As for “Me,” I’ve learned many troubling things and feel a duty to disseminate them to others. My opinions reflect the voice of many who are not given an outlet, rather than restrictive and narrow-minded outlets exist such as the Eye. The Boycott is in the interest of more diverse and objective community reflected media. Do you have an issue with that concept?
People do not have to align with everything that I believe, merely certain central principles.
Comment / By Terrence McNally / Dec. 10, 2009, 9:49 p.m.
Jason, you are in fact, too boring to read. And long winded. Also, boring. And real kookie. But mainly boring.
Comment / By Arcatan / Dec. 11, 2009, 6:23 a.m.
Jason, your 15 minutes are up.
Comment / By diggums / Dec. 11, 2009, 9:30 a.m.
Jason, maybe it’s not the rest of the world that is screwed up, maybe it is you. You have been crying foul for how many years now? How many words have you written since the Associated Student flap just trying to be understood? It is not that we, the anonymous blog responders of Arcata, don’t know the facts you present, we get it, we hear you loud and clear, I understand your points and I want you to understand that you are, as my grandpa would say, crazier than a shit-house rat. I don’t think you are dangerous, I don’t think that county mental health will keep you, but you need a mental health evaluation. Try some talk therapy, used to be free at the Open Door. Just give it a try. I apologize for the name calling.
Comment / By Jason Robo / Dec. 11, 2009, 3:32 p.m.
Here are some notable quotes on insanity, everything is relative after all and you are a product of your environment. Diggums, you seem to think the world is perfectly healthy though, so I guess this would make no sense to you. Perhaps insanity is banging one’s head against a wall trying to deprogram the brainwashed masses.
“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” - Einstein
“In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane.” -Oscar Wilde
“Insanity is the only sane reaction to an insane society.” -Thomas Szas
“The object in life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.” -Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.” -Mark Twain
Ter-rants McNasty, I thought you were going to find something better to do? Did you get my response on the boycott site to your farewell comment?
Arcatan, I’m not the one making me the focus of this rather than discussing the boycott’s focus of addressing a threat to our community. Perhaps Hoover would have the nerve to debate this matter and Hank can moderate. That is if Hoover isn’t too scared to step outside cheap shots on the internet, his own paper or his buddy Matthews radio show.
Comment / By Hank Sims / Dec. 11, 2009, 5:35 p.m.
I’m in!
Comment / By Hank Sims / Dec. 11, 2009, 5:36 p.m.
I’m in!
Comment / By diggums / Dec. 11, 2009, 8:46 p.m.
dude, how do you differ from the Einstein definition? someone who Jason trusts needs to have a serious discussion with him about the state of his mental health. You need help, not hookah.
Comment / By Terrence McNally / Dec. 12, 2009, 2 a.m.
J-Bo - what could possibly be a better use of my time than helping you expose the truths of Sept. 11 and all remaining 364 days of the year? I didn’t read your reply on your ning site cuz you’re too damn boring. But keep it coming. I’m already sleepy!
Comment / By Arcatan / Dec. 12, 2009, 7:50 a.m.
Quit answering Jason’s posts. it only reinforces his notion that somebody is interested. It was funny initially, but now its just sad.
Comment / By Terrence McNally / Dec. 12, 2009, 2:47 p.m.
Why would I not take an interest in someone who’s harassing my clients, friends, coworkers and people who put food… on my family? I’m extremely interested, Arcatan. Jason has really piqued my interest. He still hasn’t come home to lead the movement and this is one of the few places I’m able to express my interest in him.
Comment / By Terrence McNally / Dec. 12, 2009, 2:47 p.m.
Why would I not take an interest in someone who’s harassing my clients, friends, coworkers and people who put food… on my family? I’m extremely interested, Arcatan. Jason has really piqued my interest. He still hasn’t come home to lead the movement and this is one of the few places I’m able to express my interest in him.
Comment / By Arcatan / Dec. 12, 2009, 8:55 p.m.
Terrence, You have a point there. But he’s a sick, pathetic little creature and you will probably be reading a police log entry about him going to SV in the not too distant future.
Comment / By bald grey loser / Dec. 12, 2009, 11:25 p.m.
y’all gots to chill. and stop scrutinizing you neighbors, students, employees, friends, passer by’s, adversaries, lovers, children, mothers, grannies, pets, tennis pros, massues, chauffers, butlers, slaves, and inferiors. PLEASE!! p.s. your not going to figure me out by eating my brain are hitting me with sticks till i poop candy im not a caga tio
Comment / By Terrence McNally / Dec. 13, 2009, 7:19 a.m.
OK, Arcatan - I agree with what you’re saying in principle… I’ll be nice.
Comment / By Arcatan / Dec. 13, 2009, 11:06 a.m.
Terrence, I think you should go in for the psychic kill now. Jason’s weakened by the our collective ridicule. It should be easy for you to deliver the KO at this point.
Comment / By bastards of young / Dec. 13, 2009, 1:51 p.m.
in response to Burstiners article,: The mics have been in the hands of the trendy pink haired for quite somtetime. Kanye West had a point when he outed Taylor Swift as a psuedo-artist lifted up by the masses as note worthy, PLEASE. “Beyonce had one of the greatest videos of all time.”
He was right, it was a nod to the classic, an homage to the late great Bob Fossi and people will never know the root of true gifted human talent if we give creedece to flash in the pan
Comment / By humbeau / Dec. 15, 2009, 4:28 p.m.
Marcy didn’t you just ruin a student’s privacy by alleging that he got a certain grade in your class? For shame grades are not to be public record.