NY Times Needs a Better Proofreader

[maestrob]

The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, are a threat to public health because they give people a false sense of security, increasing the likelihood that someone might be exposed to the virus while attending class, a music concert or when traveling by plane.

Of course we all know that this poorly written extra-long sentence should read:

"The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, is a threat to public health because these masks give people a false sense of security..."

I rest my case.

Yesterday I saw a headline on CNN that mentioned "President Biden's duel possibilities..."

Instead of "dual possibilities."

Stuff like this is happening quite frequently, almost on a daily basis.

Just who the devil is teaching English to our future journalists these days? Participation trophies just don't cut it, do they???

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/30/heal ... -fake.html

[Holden Fourth]

The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, are a threat to public health because they give people a false sense of security, increasing the likelihood that someone might be exposed to the virus while attending class, a music concert or when traveling by plane.

Of course we all know that this poorly written extra-long sentence should read:

"The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, is a threat to public health because these masks give people a false sense of security..."

I rest my case.

Yesterday I saw a headline on CNN that mentioned "President Biden's duel possibilities..."

Instead of "dual possibilities."

Stuff like this is happening quite frequently, almost on a daily basis.

Just who the devil is teaching English to our future journalists these days? Participation trophies just don't cut it, do they???

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/30/heal ... -fake.html

It's just an indication of the low level of intelligence of the majority of journalists.

[Rach3]

It's just an indication of the low level of intelligence of the majority of journalists.

A majority which swelled dramatically when Fox arrived.

[barney]

The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, are a threat to public health because they give people a false sense of security, increasing the likelihood that someone might be exposed to the virus while attending class, a music concert or when traveling by plane.

Of course we all know that this poorly written extra-long sentence should read:

"The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, is a threat to public health because these masks give people a false sense of security..."

I rest my case.

Yesterday I saw a headline on CNN that mentioned "President Biden's duel possibilities..."

Instead of "dual possibilities."

Stuff like this is happening quite frequently, almost on a daily basis.

Just who the devil is teaching English to our future journalists these days? Participation trophies just don't cut it, do they???

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/30/heal ... -fake.html

It's just an indication of the low level of intelligence of the majority of journalists.

I rather resent that. How many journalists do you know? Most of us?

What's your evidence that journalists are any stupider than, say, teachers? I would rather say it's as much evidence of the very low standards of education and the ignorance of teachers. I lectured in grammar, both to theological students about to tackle Greek and Hebrew, and to newspaper sub-editors. Where did I learn? Not from English, but learning Latin, then Greek and Hebrew myself. Learning Latin, I had to learn the parts of speech and how to parse them. How many teachers can teach that? The other way I, and many, learned was through very extensive reading. Most people seem to confine their reading to social media these days, where they learn such locutions as c u l8r. Journalists are probably among the more widely read.

[barney]

The world of journalism has changed, like many arenas. When I joined The Age in 1981 a reporter's story was read, in order, by a copy taster (to determine how worthy it was), a page editor, a sub-editor, a check sub-editor, a proof reader, and then again by another sub or reader on the page proof. Six sets of eyes, checking not just for literals but libels, errors of fact, missing information, technical issues such as hyphenation and justification, all sorts of potential problems. But we were print-only and had hours in the main.
Today it may be read by just two pairs of eyes before publication - IF you are lucky. It may be just one, not counting the reporter. There may be only a couple of minutes between filing and publication. Do I regret this? Of course. But there are benefits too.

[maestrob]

The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, are a threat to public health because they give people a false sense of security, increasing the likelihood that someone might be exposed to the virus while attending class, a music concert or when traveling by plane.

Of course we all know that this poorly written extra-long sentence should read:

"The flood of fake and poorly made masks, they say, is a threat to public health because these masks give people a false sense of security..."

I rest my case.

Yesterday I saw a headline on CNN that mentioned "President Biden's duel possibilities..."

Instead of "dual possibilities."

Stuff like this is happening quite frequently, almost on a daily basis.

Just who the devil is teaching English to our future journalists these days? Participation trophies just don't cut it, do they???

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/30/heal ... -fake.html

It's just an indication of the low level of intelligence of the majority of journalists.

I rather resent that. How many journalists do you know? Most of us?

What's your evidence that journalists are any stupider than, say, teachers? I would rather say it's as much evidence of the very low standards of education and the ignorance of teachers. I lectured in grammar, both to theological students about to tackle Greek and Hebrew, and to newspaper sub-editors. Where did I learn? Not from English, but learning Latin, then Greek and Hebrew myself. Learning Latin, I had to learn the parts of speech and how to parse them. How many teachers can teach that? The other way I, and many, learned was through very extensive reading. Most people seem to confine their reading to social media these days, where they learn such locutions as c u l8r. Journalists are probably among the more widely read.

Barney, as usual, I'm with you on this. When I was in high school, we were taught grammar by an English teacher who, aside from being a lover of classical music (He let me bring in the then brand new recording of Charles Ives's Fourth Symphony, its first, with Stokowski, and we played some excerpts.), was brilliantly talented at diagramming sentences. We were drilled for many months on Direct Objects, Indirect Objects, where prepositions should go (NEVER at the end of a sentence!), how to handle plurals of words that end in the letter "s," never to repeat the same word in a paragraph and so on. This in high school! I had studied French since seventh grade and a smattering of German, went on to major in modern languages at Villanova, studying how modern Romance languages evolved from Latin, along with 2 years of Russian (They didn't even have an alphabet until 800 A. D.).

I wonder, then, how many of today's young people are offered such opportunities in preparation for an internship at CNN?

I am totally convinced by the spelling mistakes and mildly confusing grammar I get from my younger relatives that abbreviations are the norm now (their=there etc.). It just makes me sad that the beauty of Shakespeare's language is just not appreciated these days. I mentioned diagramming a sentence to my very successful nephew (He's got his own tax & accounting firm at 33!), and he gave me a totally blank stare, as did my niece.

Guess I'm the beneficiary of white privilege!

[barney]

Thanks Brian. I can't speak for non-whites on this, but I am sure they too prize clarity, brevity and elegance in communication. Just look at all the brilliant non-white novelists. My experiencewith sub-editors was that they wanted to learn but hugely lacked confidence - and rightly. Today in newspapers it's common to find misuse of pronouns such as "the judge told he and his co-accused they faced jail", in which the subject or nominative "he" is chosen rather than the direct object or accusative "him" precisely because it sounds clumsy, and the uninitiated think that means it must be right. Sadly I no longer think, as I once did, that wide reading necessarily helps people develop better language skills.