Slate's media critic Jack Shafer should be required reading at all j-schools. His col on the Boston Globe's phoney-baloney girl/girl attack story is yet another example of the benefits of close reading:
The sixth or seventh paragraph of a bogus trend story usually contains the seed of its own destruction, but only rarely does a such trend story announce its bogusity in the subhead, as does a piece in today's (Sept. 4) Boston Globe.
"Vicious Attacks By Girl Cliques Seen Increasing," reads the piece's headline. The subhead-"Despite Police Statistics, Violence Causing Worries"-all but cancels the assertion of an increase in girl-on-girl violence. Indeed, the story's sixth paragraph cites Boston police statistics that show a decline in aggravated assaults by girls, ages 14 to 19.
Shafer uncharatertistically got mushy over H.L. Mencken in reason here.
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