Now comes another example of McClatchy's Raleigh News & Observer's “news team” at work.
A few minutes ago, a journalist friend emailed:
_______________
John,
Along the line of what we were discussing, take a look at the N&O's Web site.
You'll see a headline: "Duke police investigate new rape case." (bold added)
Now, we don't know whether or not a rape occurred at the lacrosse party, but suddenly the N&O declares that Duke police are looking into a "new" rape case, this one in a dormitory.
The paper is playing too loose with language.
"New rape case" leads the reader to think, yes, a rape did occur at the lacrosse party (evidence to the contrary notwithstanding). This is truly shoddy journalism.
The headline should read, "Duke police investigate reported rape."(bold added)
_____________
My friend’s right in one way. The headline should read,
"Duke police investigate reported rape,"as long as we assume all The N&O wanted to do was report news.
But what if The N&O wanted to smear the young students on Duke Men's lacrosse team?
In that case, the headline,
"Duke police investigate new rape case,"works a lot better, doesn't it?
Let’s give McClatchy's N&O “news team” credit for knowing how to frame.
You guys are both correct except that
ReplyDeletethe proper headline should be
"Duke police investigate new rape allegation."
If you say "reported" rape, again it's
an affirmative statement that a rape
happened.
The way national network news ran with
this non-national story for days on
end like it was a crisis, was a joke.
What they fail to realize is that
after crying wolf so often, people
wise up to it. Columbine was a
tragic crime to be sure, but how
many million times was it necessary
to run that video of the kids
running from the school?
Fortunately, the blogsphere is
beginning to decay and overturn the
dis-information hegemony of the
mega-corp American media.
- Roy in Cincinnati