The Spicy Crunchwrap Supreme Eating Motherfucker uses “we” where “I” would surely be more appropriate.
As many of you will remember, back in June, a source we thought was reliable leaked to us that one of the names in the infamous Jason Grimsley HGH affidavit was Chris Mihlfeld (above), who is the former trainer for Grimsley and the longtim (sic) trainer of Albert Pujols. As evidenced by the Los Angeles Times this weekend, our source was, sadly, wrong. And therefore, so were we: Mihlfeld appears not to be named in the document.
So, a clearing of the decks, a mea culpa: We were wrong to trust our source’s information, and we were wrong to print their claim that he was in the document. We apologize to Mihlfeld and deeply regret the error.
Nice work, Screech. They must be very proud of you at the Daily Illini.
compounded with: grandiose faults of logic and lack of substance, and the bro-pandering, and the outright theft, the we/i thing is the straw that broke the camel’s back with regard to my reading that site.
Glad you can take a firm stand on this issue.
James, once i started reading the “we”s under the assumption that we = writer + talking cat only he can hear, the site didn’t seem any better but at least I had something to register with the Writers’ Guild that CBS might pick up in 2009 on the tail end of the blogger-premised sitcom fad.
James,
we know exactly where you are coming from. We’ll do our best not to fall into the same trap. We thank you for your continued visits. There’s no “I” in “team”, but if you rearrange the letters, they do turn into “MEAT”
TBL, on the countless occasions I’ve used the word “we”, I was referring to the invisible cult I think I am leading. Them, and the several talking cats on premises.
In this instance, crunchy’s use of “we” is less offensive to me on the stylistic scale but seems more like a way to personally distance himself from whatever mountain of shit he created for Mihlfeld and Pujols. Really, if the Gawker Media as a whole is responsible, perhaps Denton should issue a company apology, too. But until then, this is all about a guy who has shown little hesitancy in trying to make a name for himself at the expense of others. The apology is warranted and a rare stand-up act from someone who has virtually redefined “gutless” over the past 12 months. But I’d be more impressed if the entry had been titled, “WE HAVE NO CREDIBILITY. PLEASE SHOOT US/ME/IT”
CSTB, we appreciate it. Thank you all.
One point about the content, though — what’s especially damning about this story is that if Lil’ Weitch had actually put his journalism degree to any use and taken the scenic route through K.C. to Busch III, he might have been able to dig something up. Other than the personal trainer, the only scummier presence in baseball is Tony LaRussa’s vegan flatulence. And Ezequiel Astacio’s Motörwarts. My understanding of the function of the Source is that, once given a tip, you follow through with it and see where it leads. Maybe it leads to Pujols’ duffel bag. Maybe it circles back upon itself and takes you to some paranoid lunatic with a vendetta. But I guess that kind of “dirty work” is for the boring old curmudgeons in print, the same ones who “just don’t understand” blogging, especially when a blogger expects to get away with a one liner apology masked by Latin for potentially ruining a guy’s reputation and livelihood. That, to me, is more fucked up than using the royal “we.”
James,
well put. There might actually be more to a bona fide scoop than merely reposting a hot tip. It would be simplistic to say that’s the difference between journalism and blogging (lord knows, there’s enough inaccuracies from the former), but if the Whoopie Cushion is gonna accept mainstream praise for the hot stories he’s “broken”, he oughta be prepared to take a punch or two over this one.
Would a similar goof cost someone their job in the print world?
The standards of print journalism and enterprise blogging are so different, though. A print writer would surely lose his or her job for simply disobeying the standards of journalism. Bloggers of the Gawker Media ilk are charged with providing entertainment, not news, devoid of context and substance. As long as those advertising dollars keep rolling in, a guy can continue to sit on his couch and converse with his cats.
That’s not to generalize, either. I understand your point re: it being all too easy and simplistic to define blogging as yellow journalism and print journalism as The Infallible Truth. There have indeed been enough print scandals and legitimate blog scoops to argue otherwise. I just don’t see how a guy can blast those with press credentials as being lazy, obsolete or worse when something like this was bound to come back and bite him in the ass. And, as stated, not for lack of truth to the rumor, but for lack of the inherent work ethic required to get to that truth.
We’ve enjoy this thread very much.
Also, what might be worse than Mr. Crunchwrap’s poor and misinformed journalism is the “priviledged” commentors of Brospin applauding him/them for making an apology. Next time I “accidentally” ruin someone’s reputation I’ll have to remember that the road towards text apologies on the internet takes “guts”. This all makes me want to eat Taco Bell and vomit all over the Arizona Cardinals.
Not to change the subject, but where’d you get that photo of Sgt. Hauk from The Wire?