Adopt me, said Grandpa Han
His greatest fear? That he would die in his bed, that someone — much later — would find his bones.
That’s why retiree Han Zicheng, a survivor of the Cultural Revolution, China’s civil war and Japan’s invasion, wrote an ad asking someone to adopt him.
“Lonely old man in his 80s. Strong-bodied,” he wrote. “Can shop, cook and take care of himself. No chronic illness … My hope is that a kindhearted person or family will adopt me, nourish me through old age and bury my body when I’m dead.”
A woman in his neighborhood posted a picture of his note, adding, “I hope warm-hearted people can help.” Local media reported the story, and the Washington Post’s Emily Rauhala and Yang Liu got interested, meeting him at his home in Tianjin for the first time on Jan. 3.
“Our plan was to follow him until he was adopted,” Rauhala told Poynter early Thursday. “Unfortunately, that did not happen. All told, we followed him for about three months.”
Grandpa Han’s written plea — and the stories such as the Post’s, which ran Wednesday — shed light on a huge social issue in a nation that lived under a One Child policy for decades. Where to go when you are old and lonely and there is no family? For the Post, Rauhala tries to tell big stories through people, as do reporters at local outlets, but her beat holds 1 billion people.
“It’s a matter of patience, both in terms of finding the right person to anchor a story and letting them tell it on their own terms,” Rauhala said by email. “Grandpa Han knew he had a story to tell and he wanted, very much, to tell it. He wrote up the adoption notice and posted it on a shop window. He gave interviews about his life. He shared his fear. We listened.”
These are the types of stories the Beijing-based Rauhala adores, both as a writer and a reader.
“In the last few years, I’ve profiled a Filipino cop who refused President Duterte’s call to kill, a worker-poet who jumped to his death and an Uighur pop star trying to make it in the Chinese mainstream,” she said. “Each of them told their story in a different, revealing way.”
Without revealing spoilers — or the twist ending — Rauhala says Grandpa Han’s unvarnished honesty captured the readers who have sent her notes on the story.
“I think a lot of people can relate to his story,” she said, “and were moved by his willingness to speak so candidly about things most of us don't talk about — loneliness, illness and age.”
Here’s Grandpa Han’s story, via Rauhala. You won’t regret the time you spend reading it.
Every editor’s nightmare: Procedures change after gun ad ends up on front page
The local paper for the tragedy that dominated headlines earlier this year — the Parkland school massacre — found itself apologizing and changing policies after a nightmare juxtaposition of news and advertising.
South Florida’s Sun Sentinel temporarily banned all gun ads and changed editing procedures after an ad slipped onto a front page that featured stories on a Parkland victims fund and the guilty plea of another mass shooter.
After an outcry from readers and at least one parent of a Parkland shooting victim, publisher Nancy Meyer said: “We are taking steps to ensure this does not happen again.” Meyer placed a temporary moratorium on all gun ads and noted that such ads were never supposed to be on the front page in the first place.
A new desk policy instituted Wednesday requires all front-page proofs to be in hard copy so that the entire page can be seen at a glance before printing, editor-in-chief Julie Anderson told Poynter. (Read our full story here).
The Sun Sentinel’s swift public response was praised by one irate reader, Fred Guttenberg, whose daughter Jaime was among those killed in Parkland. “They did more than apologize; they actually put a moratorium in place on more gun advertising," Guttenberg told the Miami New Times.
Quick hits
THE END: Cambridge Analytica announced it was shutting down, beginning proceedings to dissolve in the U.K. and U.S. That follows news that the firm, used by the 2016 Trump campaign, misused Facebook data on a broad scale without the social network’s knowledge. Officials said it lost clients and has incurred legal expenses surrounding the misuse of data. Rebranding, said one official, would be futile.
FACEBOOK AUDIT: A former GOP senator from Arizona and the conservative Heritage Foundation will help lead a Facebook-approved audit of ideological bias at the social network, Axios’s Sara Fischer reported. The tech giant also agreed to an civil rights audit, guided by Laura Murphy, a national civil liberties and civil rights leader.
MISCONDUCT: At least three female New York Times employees had accused departed metro editor Wendell Jamieson of inappropriate behavior, the NYT’s Tiffany Hsu reported. Jamieson would not comment for the article. His resignation, announced Monday, followed an internal investigation, and Susan Chira was named as interim metro editor.
WARNED ABOUT ROSE: The Washington Post reports this morning that Charlie Rose's transgressions at CBS were more numerous and lasted longer than previously thought. From Amy Brittain and Irin Carmon: "Concerns about Rose’s behavior were flagged to managers at the network as early as 1986 and as recently as April 2017, when Rose was co-anchor of 'CBS This Morning,' according to multiple people with firsthand knowledge of the conversations."
UNFAKE: A former Tea Party activist has gone in a new direction: Helping people wean themselves from rumors and unsubstantiated stuff on the internet. Now Felicia Cravens and a group of amateur debunkers have uncovered a network of more than 100 fake Facebook accounts spreading pro-Trump content on groups and on their profiles, BuzzFeed’s Craig Silverman reports.
NEW CHAIR: Terry Kroeger, the publisher of the Omaha World-Herald and president and CEO of Warren Buffett’s media holdings, has been elected chair of the New Media Alliance. The nonprofit group represents 2,000 news organizations and their multiplatform businesses worldwide. Kroeger’s branch of Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, BH Media Group, is the ninth largest newspaper group in America.
START NOW TO SAVE YOUR STUDENT PAPER: The decision was made in secret. The alums found out too late to save it. How The Daily Campus, the venerable independent newspaper of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, is now under university control, and what you can do to make sure it doesn’t happen at your school. The story is written by two Daily Campus alums, ProPublica’s Jessica Huseman and Texas Christian University’s Daxton “Chip” Stewart.
What we’re reading
THINKING OF OTHERS: Two African American men arrested for no reason at a Starbucks settled with Philadelphia for a symbolic $1 each — and a promise by the city to spend $200,000 on a program for young entrepreneurs. “This is the best way to see that change that we want to see," said Donte Robinson, one of those arrested. "It's not a right-now thing that's good for right now, but I feel like we will see the true change over time."
CALIFORNIA’S 70-YEAR STERILIZATION PROGRAM: From 1909 to 1979, California had an active eugenics program that forcibly sterilized 20,000 people. Now, Journalist Resource reports, data show that officials disproportionately sterilized Latinas. California lawmakers are considering paying damages to victims of forced sterilization; North Carolina began such payouts in 2014.
CLOCKWINDER, STREET SCRIBE: The Atlantic’s Alan Taylor collected these images of people doing work that likely will not exist in the next decade or two.
SHUNNED: “Is Israel’s most famous playwright too political for his own country?” That’s the Forward’s headline on a profile of Joshua Sobol, who’s latest play, “The Last Act,” cannot find a stage in his homeland. (It premieres May 18 in Boston). “Act” is set in modern-day Israel, with an Israeli and Palestinian antagonist, tracing the fate that befalls an act of cooperation.
SLIMY TREATMENT: They were forced to go topless. They were told to go out with strange men. The NYT’s Juliet Macur exposes the shoddy way the Washington Redskins have treated their cheerleaders.
EATING YOUR FEELINGS: Don’t think of sweets or carbs as a drug or an addiction, because then you have no control. Think of these dopamine-producing foods as challenges to regulate, says nutritionist Dana James in this fascinating piece. What to tell yourself instead? James suggests: “These are actually just too pleasurable for me, I don’t have the ability to regulate myself, so I’m not going to have any right now.”
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Got a tip, a link, a suggestion? We’re trying to make this roundup better every day. Please email me at dbeard@poynter.org. (A quick thanks to all of you who emailed Wednesday on whether journalists can still bridge communities in a polarized America: I'll publish a few of your thoughts on Friday).
Have a great Thursday.