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Worst Philly media moments of 2011: Thai sex workers, smear campaigns and more
From getting spun on a Swiftboat-style smear campaign, to doling out bootstrapping advice to Philly's underprivileged youths, we crown the worst of 2011.
Worst Philly media moments of 2011: Thai sex workers, smear campaigns and more
Sometimes we reporters mess up. And sometimes, we screw up in particularly scandalous, offensive and/or barely-forgivable ways. I regularly read or listen to, and enjoy, each of the publications that I viciously attack below. I spend hours with the Daily News and Inquirer every day. But here I go, throwing stones from my house of glass, and look back at some of the articles that I criticized in 2011, and some that I haven't—yet. In no particular order:
1) Gene “if I was a poor black boy” Marks, a local financial advice guru who appears on television and writes books sold in the “self-help” aisle, took it upon himself to pen an advice column from a “short, balding and mediocre certified public accountant” (his words) to “poor black kids.” In particular, he had “a poor black kid in West Philadelphia” in mind. The Forbes missive, titled “If I was a poor black kid,” urged poor black kids to 1) stop complaining about their crappy schools and study harder, and 2) use technology and have Skype conversations with other go-getter ghetto youth. This is, I argued, “The worst article ever written by a Philadelphian.” My full takedown is here.
2) Philadelphia magazine aims to please a high-end and deeply out-of-touch suburban readership (Top Doctors, Top Dentists, Top Homes! And newsflash: wealthy moms think smoking pot is cool). But they reached new heights of Main Line condescension when they decided to include the Mummers on their “10 Things We Need To Get Rid Of” list—part of December's mind-numbing “List Issue.” Raising the asshole stakes, they decided to kick award-winning and proudly queer working class poet CA Conrad out of their office. Editor Tom McGrath then went on to confess that he didn't know who Conrad was. “I wouldn’t have known CA Conrad from Joseph Conrad.” Then again, I doubt that right-wing magazine owner Herb Lipson gives much of a damn about gay poets either. Read my full report here.
3) In November, Inquirer and Daily News owners at Philadelphia Media Network announced they were moving from their iconic North Broad location to the long-vacant Strawbridge and Clothier site on Market East. Oh, and the papers' two newsrooms would merge! But you didn't read it there, by which I mean, in the city's two daily papers. Both failed to report on the significance of the newsroom merger or even explain what it would entail. Would it spell the end of two competing dailies in Philadelphia? Some think so, some think not, and some approve while others are freaked out. It fell to City Paper to report it.
4) Both papers also failed to report on the very big fact that they were receiving a big city subsidy for the big move. WHYY's Dave Davies, onetime long-time senior writer at the Daily News, took them to task for it. Both papers should have a reporter who is charged with doing critical and independent reporting on their boss when necessary. They should also have an ombudsman, which the Daily News has but the Inquirer lacks. Speaking of the Daily News...
5) On Nov. 16, the Daily News decided to go negative on Occupy Philly after weeks of praise. But what rankles all standards of journalistic decency is this: they regurgitated a bizarre conspiracy theory that radicals were coordinating buses full of outside anarchists to infiltrate the protest.
“Members of the 'sensible' faction say that [activist Cindy] Milstein is linked to a group of roughly 10 to 20 anarchists in Occupy Philly and that their numbers were swelled by outsiders, possibly bused in, on Friday night, when an assembly voted to defy the city and remain at Dilworth.”
As I wrote at the time, “In fact, Philadelphia (in particular, West Philly) has one of the largest anarchist populations of any city that I know. If anything, it would make more sense if our anarchists were being bused to invade other cities!” More here.
5) Speaking of Occupy Philly: somebody just needs to say that Philadelphia Weekly's Matt Petrillo's copious reporting was heavy on the melodrama and verged on the bizarre. Among his articles that begin looking like straight news and then slip into confusing editorials: “The idea of a single leader directly goes against the foundation of Occupy, which, above all else, is bound together the idea of a super-majority... But it’s current model creates a inevitable minority, and neglecting to put a singular face to the movement, especially in the midst of ambivalent internal issues, could foreshadow its possible demise.”
Whoa! Bold—and confusing—prediction.
Other Occupy articles exhibited little understanding of the difference between Occupy and the Tea Party, and betrayed a too-hasty venture into political strategy and philosophy. “Occupy’s future relies on the execution [sic] of its political structure and, most importantly, organization. By accepting everyone, Occupy could potentially create a supermajority–but that wouldn’t be for some time. However, if the internal conflicts grow serious enough and these issues are ignored, it could have damaging repercussions.”
Others begin with sentences that defy all efforts at interpretation, such as this one: “Occupy Philly is an unusual creature of a political party when it comes to reform.”
6) We at City Paper tend to hate on Daily News columnist Stu Bykofksy for his antipathy toward bikes, immigrants and people who don't celebrate Christmas. But when he recently expressed just plain weird feelings about prostitution in Thailand, some speculated that he might actually get fired. Okay, wait—I'll let Stu tell the story: Earlier this month, he wrote, “In the wake of a personal hurricane that tore apart my life, I ran all the way to Thailand” to visit “college friend Paul DeCeglie...[who] ran to weather he liked, a lower cost of living, a laid-back Thai lifestyle and low-cost, no-guilt sex.”
Stu then shared his icky soft-core descriptions of Thai women's bodies: “Thai women tend to be slim, with soft features and thick black hair. Thailand's No. 1 export to the U.S. may be wives.” Oh, and more on Thai women: an “endless supply of girls with no marketable skills, but rentable bodies, heads for cities to work in the sex trade.” Byko says that prostitution “makes me feel bad, but every journey is external and internal. It's true for me, DeCeglie and the Thai bar girl.” WTF?! As Asian-American activist Helen Gym summed it up: “Nothing could be more stark than the hypocrisy of a columnist known for ranting about illegal crossings into the United States simultaneously crossing national borders to leer about illegal activity — all the while ducking and weaving about whether he himself engaged in such acts.” (Philebrity's reflection on the matter is also worth reading)
7) The Inquirer's Susan Snyder, the lead author of an otherwise solid investigation of violence in Philadelphia public schools, took a strange detour and decided to wage an unsubstantiated campaign to arm Philadelphia's school police force. There were two big problems with this: there are already armed Philadelphia police officers in public schools, which she failed to note; and the “evidence” gathered to support the efficacy of armed school police from Houston was highly misleading and ultimately completely inconsequential. Read my take on the article's shortcomings here.
8) Chris Brennan, who writes the normally well-informed Philly Clout column for the Daily News, uncovered what he thought were discrepancies in then-City Council candidate David Oh's military record: “Military officers: Council hopeful Oh was no Green Beret”. He then proceeded to provide the media conduit for an ongoing, and seriously unbalanced, attack against him (“Veterans slam David Oh for misleading military claims”).
According to my colleague Isaiah Thompson, “Oh took heat from the Daily News and a small group of veterans (organized by a veteran with a personal grudge against Oh) over having referred to himself as 'Green Beret,' and a 'Special Forces Officer.' It turns out that he was assigned a green beret and designated a Special Forces officer.”
Brennan failed to note that the allegation that Oh had misrepresented himself as a former Green Beret was part of a politically motivated campaign with no support from any established veterans organization and what forces might be lurking behind such an effort: namely, electricians union boss and political kingmaker John “Johnny Doc” Dougherty. It turns out Johnny Doc spent a lot of money going after Oh. Instead, Brennan made it seem like Philly vets had turned on Oh, even though the opposite was true. Oh won the election.
9) City Paper's Daniel Denvir (wait, that's me) wrote a blog post about a debate between GOP Senate hopefuls, including African-American Philadelphian Robert Mansfield, “who was wearing sunglasses inside.” I then received a note alerting me that his glasses were "prescribed and a personal necessity, due to a severe injury he sustained while serving our country in Iraq." Oh man, that is really, truly, and cringe-inducingly embarrassing: sorry to Mansfield and to readers. Rule of thumb: before making fun of someone's apparel, ensure that it is not medically necessary, particularly if caused by injuries received in combat.
I guess we all make mistakes...
A fun read!!!!— mark segal- careful what you say about petrillo on the internet! you might get a personal email extolling the "insightful critiques" of his work, even when you just comment anonymously on one of his articles (as i did).— jkudler
- Thanks for compiling.— kishwerv
- I'll admit that I'm not super familiar with Petrillo, but I did read his articles, and thought they just made no sense at all. The sentence structure was all out of whack. I figured nobody took him seriously.— HandNik
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