Adding A Question Mark Makes Everything OK (?)
Total bullcrap journalistic practice that needs to die in an incinerator, #26345: The misleading headline/question mark combo. For whatever reason, writers are able to get away with some of the most absurd, heinous implications with the addition of uncertainty, via question mark. For example, if a headline said “[insert your favorite President] Routinely Murdered Grandmothers With His Bare Hands,” you’d know the article wasn’t worth reading because that is absolutely nowhere in the record of facts. But if it was “[insert your favorite President] Routinely Murdered Grandmothers With His Bare Hands?”, all of a sudden you’re thinking, “You know what? Maybe there’s something there.” And then the article’s about economic policy and you’re just irate.
(This uncertainty is so zany!)
So while it’s no surprise, it’s still disappointing that the practice has bled over to PRO FOOTBALL TALK, where a recent headline read, and we quote, “Brandon Jacobs wants to beat up Tony Siragusa?” The article itself had absolutely nothing that suggested that Jacobs was upset; in fact, the only time Jacobs even mentioned Siragusa was to say he didn’t care about him. Booooooo. Poor form.
Or is it poor form? We’re going to print the notes for our fantasy football team, but give it all some fun headlines. Let’s see if we can’t gin up a few cheap pageviews on this one. Read more…
