THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 6, 1995 TAG: 9508050002
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: LYNN FEIGENBAUM
LENGTH: Long : 102 lines
Wash your mouth out, (NU)*&%+!. Delete those expletives. Keep the newspaper safe for children.
This message pops up once in a while when our censors ``slip up'' and let in an unbleeped blasphemy or vulgarity. But . . . are there censors? What is the policy on ``bad words'' and when do we just say no?
Not quickly enough for readers like Francis Scott of Chesapeake, who objected to a line in Monday's Sports story on ``Karm'z Kidz.''
It quoted Redskins defensive line coach Bob Karmelowicz as saying, ``You don't want to kick the other guy's ass, you want to kick his ass so hard his children limp.''
Scott says he's been reading the paper for eons but this really bothered him. Children read these newspapers, he reminded us, ``and this is like telling them it's normal to talk like this.''
Scott was the only reader who called me to complain about that quote. But he's not the first to remind us this is a family newspaper and that they expect higher standards from us than what they hear in rock lyrics and on TV.
Back in June, Cheryl Kenefick of Virginia Beach objected to the phrasing of a wire story in the green sheet, about a humorous cable TV production. The story said, ``It took 200 years to piss off the Moslems. . . .''
Kenefick wasn't amused. ``I not only object to that kind of language as an adult,'' she said, ``but I have an 11-year-old who reads the Television Week.''
Another vigilant parent, the mother of three young boys, was turned off by a quote in the paper's series two months ago on affirmative action. The quote, which began on A1, was, ``You know it'll be equality when a female schmuck can get as far as a male schmuck.''
In casual American usage, this epithet means ``a contemptible or foolish person, a jerk.'' But in its original language, Yiddish, it refers to the male sex organ and is not a ``nice'' word.
One discriminating reader, who identified herself only as Joan, found a lapse on the Perspectives pages. She didn't like the ``cuss words'' in a Molly Ivins column last month.
``Why don't you at least do the courtesy of using an h and a few little dashes?'' she asked, adding that the ``gentlemen'' on the opposite-editorial pages didn't ``express themselves in that coarse manner.''
Lilly Bradley of Virginia Beach was offended by a front-page story in July about normalization of ties with Vietnam. It quoted a vet as saying, ``I think it sucks. . . . How would you feel if I was the sonofabitch who killed your mom and daddy?''
I understand the emotion, said Bradley, but did we need this sort of language?
And, finally, another reader was turned off by a seven-letter vulgarity in the recent two-day series about the Witchduck Inn murders - especially since, a few graphs earlier, we had sedately printed ``s---.''
``What kind of bull---- is that?'' bellowed the caller, who apparently felt I needed a taste of our own medicine. (He didn't use the dashes.) ``I mean, I can't have my kids read the damn Sunday paper anymore.''
A couple of observations. First, in writing this column, I realize I'm repeating the offenses simply by writing them. I hope it's for a worthy cause!
Second, citing all these ``lapses'' makes it seem like a serious, chronic problem. I haven't had dozens of heated calls about our gutter language, but it does come up pretty regularly.
Third, my examples lack the context, the tone of the stories they're in. Of course, to some readers, that doesn't matter. Cussin' is cussin', no matter where or why.
But to go back to the original questions - do we have censors? Absolutely. Each writer and editor is his or her own. However, editor Cole Campbell has weighed in on the subject.
In a recent staff newsletter, he cautioned against using potentially offensive words in prominent places, like headlines or lead paragraphs; and he told staffers they should never print such words ``gratuitously or even casually'' - particularly those with sexual or scatological connotations.
``We need to balance potential offense against the clarity of communicating important ideas or sentiments,'' he wrote, adding later: ``We should use these words in quotations when the context demands it, but we should do so in a way that is least offensive.''
Obviously, some of these guidelines have not been followed in the examples brought up here. I'm not supersensitive to profanities, but neither do I think we should flaunt them as we did in the veterans story, in the affirmative-action quote and needlessly in the green-sheet story.
To me, those coy little dashes are a cop-out - even an attention-getter. I mean, whom are we kidding when we write ``----'' after the appropriate first letter? But if you're covering a press conference or a trial and the person curses during a key statement, I guess they come in handy.
On the other hand, I don't think our children's minds will be polluted by a ``hell'' or a ``damn'' in a crime story; I'm much more concerned by their exposure to crime itself.
As for the danger of young readers stumbling across a raunchy quote 28 paragraphs into a story, frankly, I'd be delighted to know that they read that far. But I also believe the newspaper can set a good example without being stodgy and bland. All it takes is common sense and sensibilities.
Sometimes we just have to put up with the vagaries of the English language. Recently, a reader was genuinely shocked that the word ``cocksure'' was used in a Sports headline.
Well, long before we started x-rating our language, there was such a thing as the strutting barnyard rooster. . . .
by CNB