Grit

Last year, the wife of a man I used to know read an old post of mine. Though I mentioned no names and masked how I knew her, she recognized herself in the long ago described incidents. I was using her not-exactly-pro-level behavior, AS WELL AS MY OWN, to illustrate a point. It was a don’t-do-this kind of a post.

Despite my self-flagellation, the anonymity I gave her and the fact that Tell Me a Story doesn’t exactly have Bloggess levels of readership, the young woman was furious. So much so that she imperiously threatened me with legal action. Yup, over a little read post where there was no way that anyone could or would identify her.

Can I get you some sugar to go with that cup of thin-skinned narcissism?

I ignored the Red Queen’s demands to speak with my lawyer. Mind you, I did run it by my esteemed barrister. He advised that it’d be easier and cheaper just to placate the twat – less stressful and costly than going to court over her touchy tantrum. The Amazing Bob, at the time, was going through chemo and, boyhowdy, there was more than enough painful intensity on our plates.

I got her to cop to what’d make her all happy. I just needed to delete two wee paragraphs. Approx. 100 words. Fine. Easy enough.

I had to compromise my story, my writing but she was now off my back. No real biggie – this was not a column of world shattering significance. Hells, I know an author who had to do the same thing but with an entire book – OOOF! Things coulda been way worse.

Why do I bring this up (besides my usual penchant for kvetching)? Imagine what it’ll be like for the mainstream media, not known for their courage as it is, in the coming Trump era. Their scribblings are of major importance – they’re supposed to report on the crimes and misdemeanors of the government (amongst other things) not act as fluffers.

In the face of a lawsuit-happy, hypersensitive, narcissistic, spray tan addict and his gun crazed, dimwitted, reactionary, troll-brained fans, will our cowardly press do the right thing? Will they be heroes? Will they "Cry 'Havoc!', and let slip the dogs of war.” 

I SO want to be happily surprised but I’m not holding my breath. From the post 10+ Independent Online News Sources and Why America Needs More of Them on Soapboxie.

There was a time when the nightly news was synonymous with the words objective, impartial, fair and balanced. Reporters and newscasters saw it as their duty and badge of honor to inform the public, as factually as possible, of the happenings in this country and around the world. Today, instead of journalists such as Walter Cronkite, a legend in his own right who brought the scandals of Watergate and the Vietnam War to the American people unfiltered, we have the major media outlets and their Talking Heads blindly supporting “facts” as told to them by the government, corporations and anyone else they deem worthy. Unfortunately, as the Iraq war has taught us, perceived truths are not always the facts and thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died as a consequence. It is extremely disturbing that the mainstream media’s abject failure to do its job and the public's abject failure to demand that they do so could result in a "mistake" of such magnitude.

The article lists independent news sources available to anyone with access to the ‘net. There’s also a list of groups who monitor and report on fake news stories (factcheck.org and more). In this era of no such thing as facts and hogshit, brainwashing “news” stories we need reliable, hard hitting sources. I’ll continue to read the New York Times and the Washington Post – two papers not fully in Prez-elect von Clownstick’s corner. I’m also gonna bookmark the dailies listed in the Soapboxie piece.

Ya know who’s really gonna make out during the Trump years? Yeah, apart from the rich, the imbecilic lapdogs to whom he’s awarded government gigs and the war machine (how long will it take the Decomposing Jack-o-lantern to send our children, our spouses off to war? A month? A year?). Lawyers. I just hope to fuck there are more on the side of humanity and they all have giant, multi level chess playing brains, tungsten spines and empathetic, pragmatic, tenacious souls.