Bo BrinkmanMar 7
Prof. Rachel Thorn 🍉🇺🇦🏳️‍⚧️🏳️

RE: https://hachyderm.io/@mekkaokereke/116184060048303307

Considering how often the NYT in particular does this, despite being frequently called out for it, I can only conclude that it is a very deliberate choice. It's not as if journalism schools don't teach about how the passive case is used to deflect and evade. So when a journalist who has graduated from a journalism school and possibly even won a Pulitzer uses the passive case this way, they do so intentionally to deflect and evade.

Mar 7 at 2:26pmWeb
Show threadFlock of Cats 🐈 🐈 🐈 ❄️Mar 7

@RachelThornSub

On topic: yeah they knew what they were doing

Off topic: the headline is active voice but obfuscates the agent and I didn’t know the grammar name for how they did it — apparently it is a “middle construction”

Active voice: Republicans filled the room with slurs
Passive voice: The room was filled with slurs
Middle construction: The room filled with slurs

Some languages have a proper morphological middle voice but English doesn’t, so it is done via sentence structure 🤓

Show threadProf. Rachel Thorn 🍉🇺🇦🏳️‍⚧️🏳️Mar 7
@FlockOfCats Yes, I realized that as I was typing, but I went with the term most folks know. Passive or middle, it's obfuscation where no person is the subject of the sentence.
Show threadMastodon MigrationMar 7

@RachelThornSub

And yet dyed in the wool liberals continue to swear by it. It is the greatest information warfare tool ever, and it just keeps on chugging along.

Show threadCassandrichMar 7
@RachelThornSub This, but it's not journalists. It's douches with MBA and marketing backgrounds who get to write the headlines, and this is a huge problem. Any decent journalists' union would have 100% final authority over the headlines on their own articles as a non negotiable demand.
Show threadThe Sleight Doctor 🃏🍉Mar 7

@RachelThornSub Worth pointing out here that journos do not typically write their own headlines or ledes. Nor are they necessarily responsible for any editorial changes to their copy. This is not to defend the journos at the NYT - many of whom have a lot to answer for! - only to point out that they may have been forced to work within certain constraints.

This is why Paul Krugman left. A man who famously didn't need an editor became increasingly frustrated with the changes to his submitted work.

Show threadSuzanne Aldrich (she/her)Mar 7

@RachelThornSub
I stopped reading the NYT so long ago, I can’t even remember the last time I took it seriously.

@mekkaokereke