Re: Bombers v. terrorists

On Thu, 28 Jul 2005 19:21:05 -0400, Frances Kemmish
<fkemmish@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>Tony Cooper wrote:
>
>> Conjecture that a government is shaky is not news and should not be
>> news. That might be a topic for a magazine piece that is presented as
>> opinion or analysis, but it has no place in the news.
>>
>> It would become part of the news only when a statement to that effect
>> is made by someone with sufficient standing. Then, the statement
>> would be the news.
>>
>
>I have noticed before that you regard news as synonymous with official
>pronouncements. I still regard that view as bizarre.
'
I'm not sure what you mean here.

A news story does not - should not - contain conjecture. The news
reports what has happened. Where a news story contains conjecture is
when they report that someone said something that is conjecture.

In other words (to make up a simple example) , if the news reports
that 50 people demonstrated in protest of a sex offender living in a
particular neighborhood, the "news" would be the who, what, why and
when. It would not be the "what next" without some basis of knowing
what is next.

The news report would not - should not - state that the sex offender
will have to move to another neighborhood. That is conjecture. The
news report may recount the conjecture of someone, though. The report
can state that Councilman Smith said that the sex offender must move
to another neighborhood.

It's perfectly OK in the news report to use a term like "Sources
indicated that the sex offender will be forced to move to another
neighborhood." To say this, though, the reporter must really have a
source that indicated this. If he - the reporter - did not have such
a source, and fabricated the conjecture, he would be fired by any
responsible news organization.

I really don't know what you mean about official pronouncements. The
news stories that I have read deal pretty well with official
pronouncements. They might, for example, say that "Government sources
denied that...." The reporter can't very well write "Government
sources denied that..." and then add "but that claim is highly
dubious." What they can do is seek out and report on a conflicting
statement by someone else.

Perhaps you have a point, but you have not made it in such a way that
I can either explain, defend, or even retract what I've written.


--
Tony Cooper
Orlando FL
.

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