I’m behind war on Iraq. I think Saddam is a scourge upon his own people and his rule and regional stability are simply incompatible. But this is simply sickening. STEVE DUNLEAVY goes to a WWII cemetary? Why? No reason. It’s all just in the service of a riduculous “We helped out the French in WWII therefore they should support everything we do” screed.
Dunleavy reads some utterly random names off graves (no sign that he knows any of them, or they are related to anyone he mentions in his story), describes himself weeping passionately, and then says: “These names mean nothing to the French, 91 percent of whom, according to a poll, are against President Bush’s plans to make Saddam a dark mark in history.”
And, of course, he finds time through his tears to mention: “But then again, the French are against everything, including that curious American habit of showering every day.”
It’s one thing to disagree with a nation’s political stance. But this entire article is one detestable non-sequitur after another. People read this guy? People LIKE this guy?
Y’know, I really, really, REALLY get annoyed at the style of journalistic writing that rarely puts more than two sentences per paragraph… often just a single sentence. It looks pretentious, and makes it seem as if the author assumes his audience is stupid.
As for the content of the article… well… it doesn’t take much intelligence to be able to mock the French’s hygiene.
How odd. I certainly did not make that observation when I was there. I actually didn’t like Paris very much, but that was unrelated to any smells. And I spent a lot of time on the Metro.
Something like “Flogging the Dead to Sell a Load of Crap” I dunno. I hadn’t worked it out yet. Now I’m probably only gonna get necrophiliacs and Greatful Dead fans, instead of fellow Dunleavy bashers. I’d LOVE if a mod would change the title: do they really do that?
Are you serious? What other style of journalistic writing is there? It’s the standard for every class and textbook on journalism I know of; I don’t think any other type of newspaper writing is even taught.
The layout of a newspaper page is different from that of a book; paragraphs look a lot longer in those little columns. In newspaper writing, one- and two- sentence paragraphs are the standard everywhere. Anything longer is begging for an express ticket to the recycle bin.
It’s nothing against the attention span of the readers; it’s just the nature of the business.
That said, the article isextremely pretentious, but I don’t think it’s the fault of the writing style. The style, which is designed to present facts more simply and clearly, in this case does a great job of simply and clearly spotlighting the shortcomings of the writer.
One of my favorite movies of all time!