SC newspaper reporter proposes in column

The Item
“I’d like to tell you about someone very close to my heart,” writes reporter Nick McCormac at the beginning of a column published Tuesday. ”I promise you, it’s worth your time to read through to the end.” After describing how he and his girlfriend met and became inseparable, he writes, “Words are my profession. They’re my living. My job is to take the most complex, complicated and confusing situations and describe them in a concise and simplistic manner. … No matter what I do or what I say, no words could ever justifiably describe how I feel about you. But there are six words that come awfully close. Whitney Bragg, will you marry me?” She said yes. (Alternate universe: McCormac calls his girlfriend later in the day, asks if she read his column, and she says, “No, why?”)

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  • http://twitter.com/donfernandez Don Fernandez

    So you’re in favor of every reporter/copy editor/photographer having the same privilege of being able to make personal pronouncements in the pages of the daily newspaper, correct? You see no problem that there was zero news value in this piece. It wasn’t even woven within the context of a greater theme as any shrewd and skilled columnist would have done. And even then it would be walking a tightrope. 

    This was an abuse of privilege and an affront to hard-working journalists who have to painfully cut the stories they research and toil through due to the ever-shrinking newshole. It is narcissistic, clueless and ethically astonishing dreck that had zero place within the pages of a newspaper. It was, essentially, an advertisement. A free one.

    Church bulletins are the place for this. Facebook is a place for this. A WordPress blog is the place for this. Not a purported representative of the fourth estate.

    Using the “lighten up” logic, any reporter/entrepreneur with a product to hawk should be allowed to use the same space to let readers know how fantastic and revolutionary their product is. It’s only fair, after all. Just “lighten up” while the bedrock values of a professional slowly crumble. 

    It’s astonishing that in these desperate times for print journalism that ethics, the seemingly non-negotiable core of the profession, are the first thing sacrificed in the name of attention.

  • Robert Lamb

    For heaven’s sake, people, lighten up! Wish the lad and his lass all the best.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=504633504 Dan Mitchell

    He didn’t write that – it was an awkward and confusing insert by the writer of this post.

  • Anonymous

    Note his girlfriend’s response to his *other* question… “Did you read my column today?”  “No, why?” If he can’t get even his girlfriend to read his stuff, how many others are skipping it as well?

  • Gina Spadafori

    Paging John Scalzi …

  • http://twitter.com/wrwill wrwill

    Sorry to be old and jaded, but gag me. Both the writer and the editor that gave this maudlin piece of navel-gazing the OK need a reality check.

  • http://twitter.com/donfernandez Don Fernandez

    This, to me, is more illustrative of how far the profession of journalism has fallen than any subscriber statistics could possibly reveal. 

    Yes, I’m sure there are some who would get warm and fuzzy feelings about it – many columnists have revealed far more, although typically with some degree of greater societal relevancy – but it is, frankly, an abuse of space, privilege and context.

    Bottom line: you’re supposed to be offering information and context to readers, not turning what was once sacred space into your own personal “reality” show.

    To be fair, I’ve given it three reads and it unfortunately gets more awkward and offensive each time. It’s not even wrapped within the context of a greater theme or parable to make it somewhat palatable. Considering how little coverage and space is now granted to actual news – and how much anyone else would pay for an ad like this, which is essentially what this is – it’s basically unethical.
     
    I liked it better when we were anonymous vessels.