Against my own better judgement, I bring you:
How Not To Write Serious Articles
I know, I know. I'm not a pundit, I never had a journalism background, "but they mean well!", yadda, yadda. And before I get started, a disclaimer: I pulled these all from National Review's website. I looked around The New Republic for awhile, and I couldn't find anything that looked exciting without requiring me to first have a paid subscription. But hey, I tried for some sort of counterpoint; it just didn't exactly pan out.
On to the fun. First up, we have an Appeal to Emotion. See that first paragraph which anthropomorphizes Israel as a weeping mother chastising her errant children? That's exactly what I'm talking about. The thing about this sort of writing is that it really only gives a small group of people the warm fuzzies about one's article, and they started out in agreement. Everyone else gets a bit confused and/or incensed.
Using emotional wordplay which is better suited to a cheap Victorian novel may seem like a cute idea, but should be avoided. This is mostly to ensure that people don't think they live in a cheap Victorian novel and try to spend all their time painting in the Mediterranean or leading idyllic lives in the Old South.
In this next article, we see another mistake: Making Up New Countries. For the geographically challenged, there is not actually a country called 'Syran'. The implication is, of course, that Syria and Iran are almost the same thing. Of course, saying this and giving them a new shared name does not actually make them one country. It does, however, keep the author from having to type quite so much.
This Michael Ledeen article is actually quite excellent. He also manages to invoke Nazism, whilst saying lots of things about war and saying we can't just fight in Iraq, and then declaring that he doesn't mean military war. Clever, indeed.
From an article a week-and-a-half old, we see an example of Using Crummy Terms. This one is pretty much summed up by 'terror masters'. While I realize it's all the rage to find new catchy things to call bad guys, Terror Masters is not an especially inspiring creation. What's worse is that it got a book publisher's pass. I mean, really. Is that all the better we can come up with? Even 'narcoterrorists' is better.
And now I'm off to read about the KGB some more. Have a good evening, and don't forget to feed your neighborhood piranhas.
Posted by Ardith at July 31, 2006 08:07 PM | TrackBack