I went on the Sun-Sentinel (our local newspaper) message boards to read what people were saying about State Farm’s decision to pull out of the Florida Homeowners Insurance market and was very dismayed to see an entry by a WPLG Channel 10 reporter. He posted:
hey, any state farm property policy holders want to express your disgust on the local10 6pm news?? i’m a reporter looking for someone to talk to. email me with your contact info. rlohse@wplg.com
Posted by: roger | January 27, 2009 12:41 PM
Let’s forget a moment the lack of proper punctuation and capitalization from a journalist. How disappointing that WPLG is looking for someone to support a specific point of view instead of simply asking for those who would like to comment, whether they would like to express disgust or not.
I’m not happy with State Farm, either, but this is yellow journalism at its worst – deciding on a point of view and collecting only that evidence which supports it.
Whatever happened to objectivity? I’m certainly not happy about State Farm’s action, but there were people who weren’t angry and understood State Farm’s position. It doesn’t seem that this reporter was interested in hearing from THEM.
Shame on you, Roger Lohse.
Fail, WPLG. A big, fat FAIL.
I tried to send an e-mail to the station’s general manager via the General Manager contact link on the WPLG website, but the address errored out. Another FAIL for WPLG…
Are You Going To Be This Way The Rest of The Time I Know You? 
January 28, 2009 at 1:28 pm
Chances are that they have someone from State Farm to give one side so they are looking for someone to bash them about on air … that is the naïve modern media interpretation of “balanced broadcasting” … alas it really is not an isolated case!
January 28, 2009 at 11:17 pm
You know I love you. But I can’t let you mocking someone else’s English and then using the incorrect form of “its” in your post just slip by. 😉
But I totally agree. That’s not journalism, that’s editorializing. Not what I turn on the local news for… but I guess in local news, sensationalism sells. What’s sensational about reasonably agreeing with a big, bad corporation? I certainly don’t agree with it. Ugh.
January 29, 2009 at 9:01 am
Well, I do know the rule, I just don’t always think about it. And I’m not a journalist! 🙂
And Mr. Geek, you are absolutely right that it’s not an isolated case, but so many just shrug and forget about it. If more people spoke up when they saw it perhaps journalists would re-think their tactics.
Hey, I can dream.