When I was in sixth grade, one of my teachers at the since departed Fredrick Douglass Middle School (yes, I went to Douglass and was not shot once) assigned us the stereotypical, “Who I Admire” essay. I initially started writing an essay about my favorite actress, Gail Edwards, an obscure actress who played Six’s Mom on Blossom, Danny Tanner’s short-lived fiancee on Full House, and a waitress in my favorite obscure 1980s sitcom, It’s a Living. I wrote a draft, which was passable, but I could not truly pinpoint why I truly admired her. In fact, I didn’t admire her – she just happened to be the one common thread besides “poor taste” between all of my favorite television shows.
In sixth grade, we had to submit our drafts before our final essay was due, and thus I turned in this first draft about Edwards. Then, despite getting the go ahead to work on a final copy, I changed my topic one Sunday night while watching 60 Minutes with my Grandfather.
I would write my essay about how much I admired Andy Rooney.
Why would a twelve year old admire a curmudgeonly complaining journalist like Rooney, who I was forced to watch every week when with my Grandfather? Because he was a journalist, and I wanted to be a journalist, and he was a complainer, and my father said I complained more than anyone he had ever met in his entire life. (That was at the time, because my brother had not been born yet, and he eventually took the complainers crown.)
Andy Rooney was paid to write, report and complain. I liked to write, I liked to report, and I liked to complain. Why hadn’t this come to me earlier in the essay writing process?
I rewrote the essay and resubmitted it. My English teacher didn’t completely understand my change of heart, but being a sixth grade teacher, probably chalked this up to me just being twelve, the world’s second most difficult age (besides 13) and gave me my A-. (I never received an A on an essay because of my horrendous spelling. I didn’t have the wonders of spellcheck because I did not have the wonders of the computer, and was one of the only kids in the class to have to hand write my assignments. I used a dictionary, but I would always miss a word or two.)
I am not as much of a complainer in my late twenties as I was as a tweenager, but I still adore and admire Andy Rooney. And in Rooney’s vein, I wish to complain about something so grating that I finally just had to put it out there:
I hate newspaper website commenters.
Take a gander on Boston.com. A pass through DemocratandChronicle.com. Select a random story, and click on “View Comments.” Read a few, but not too many, because after 3 or 4, you will want to punch your computer screen.
Newspaper website commenters all must admire Andy Rooney, because they embrace complaining, but they are more vitriol, less intelligent, and don’t have that endearing grandfather puppy-eyed look. A typical comment on a newspaper website includes many incorrect ellipses, a gratuitous use of CAPITAL LETTERS and either an ethnic slur or other negative comment towards a cultural group.
Nothing is positive in the world of newspaper website commenters. A newspaper could post a story about a rainbow rescuing a child’s cat from a tree while everyone watching received free candy, and the comments would follow as such:
“Another waste of the taxpayers money. STUPID RAINBOW UNIONS!”
“What was the child doing outside? Why did he have a pet? Where are the parents? Why do we let just ANYONE have a kid?”
“The CIA is behind that cat. OBAMA IS WATCHING US WITH ANIMALS………………..Our world is so quickly turning into 1984.”
“jkjwlankj think that cats are cute. My mom has a cat. She lives 6 twns over. I think cats are cute. Save the cats.”
“The child’s parents should be sued. They endangered the rainbow and the cat’s lives. SUE THEM NOW.”
“What if those in the crowd had nut allergies? What if they had cavities? The distribution of free candy is horribly disruptive.”
“What a waste of space………………… Why do you PRINT this NONSENSE?!?!?!?!?!?!?”
Newspaper website comments never add anything of substance to a story, because I feel that most commenters are just being contrary for the sake of being contrary. A commenter could be for a longer school day on one article, and against it in another, picking the opposing view of the article just in order to be difficult. Commenters often want to put others, be they the reporter, subject of the story or other commenters, down.
In pieces with anything having to do with children, commenters love to label each other and those within the story as horrible parents and question why a higher power allows them to procreate. In fact, newspaper commenters make such statements on pieces with nothing to do with children, like pieces on the federal government, science breakthroughs and music reviews.
The Democrat and Chronicle is especially bad when it comes to comments on stories that single out particular ethnic groups for all of the ills of society. The story could be about Wegmans raising prices, and within five minutes, there is a comment blaming fill-in-the-blank cultural group for those higher prices. The Red Wings lose a game, a business closes, a car crash happens – it is all a minority or international groups’ fault. It’s so sickeningly sad and uneducated that I can’t bring myself to read most of the comments on the site anymore. I feel for their comment moderators.
Then you have the commenters, particularly on sports sections, who say the same thing as the person before him, who said the same thing as the person before that, who said the same thing about the person before that, and so on. For example, the 61 actual comments from a June 2009 piece about Matsuzaka being taken out of the Red Sox starting pitching rotation include roughly 10 “Sayonara Dice-K”s, 10 commenters asking the exact same question (will Clay Bucholtz get the call up in his place?) and 10 commenters making the exact same comment about the “absurdity” of the World Baseball Classic.
I believe this type of absurdly annoying commenting behavior does not fester on blogs because the author of a blog post is more apt to respond in the comments, while a newspaper journalist is not apt to. A blogger has it in his or her interest to engage the commenters, creating a sense of responsibility and respect in what is posted. A newspaper journalist has other assignments, has little hand in their article being physically placed on the website, and usually does not have to physically moderate the comments. Newspaper article commenters show little respect to the subject and journalist of the article because they have no reason to believe that those people will ever see it. It is far easier to accuse and berate someone under the veil of a screenname and the distance of the Internet.
So serial newspaper commenters, I ask that you take your inner Andy Rooney down a notch, learn some notion of the word “respect” and listen to a few Grammar Girl podcasts. Those who actually have substance to add to an article discussion are turned off by your behavior.
And with that, I’ll turn off my own Andy Rooney.