Is The Bee turning tabloid?
On a weekend leading up to what is probably one of the most critical election days in recent history, the Bee decides instead to sink to a new tawdry low. I refer to the front page article taking up more than half the space on February 3 which in shameful yellow journalism style delves into the internal strife of the Shehady family and considers Super Tuesday nothing but a sidebar. What I also find reprehensible is the embarrassing swipe the Bee takes at a local community businessman in the centennial of his life. Why the Bee deemed it necessary to literally hang out the dirty laundry concerning Mr. Larry Shehady I find beyond contempt. Is it possible the Bee was the unwitting rube in a hatchet job of someone's vendetta or worse? This story does not concern a politician, celebrity or someone else considered in the public eye, and yet the Bee treats it as if it were about Britney Spears. Seriously, do your writers have not the creativity to find something better and more important to report on? The Bee has once again proved it is a hick newspaper, but this time with the shoddiness of a gossip tabloid.-- Rick Flores
This raises one of the most difficult, and eternal, questions in journalism: When does an individual's story become a matter of public interest?
We don't make these decisions lightly. But we consider the story of a legal battle between the wife and sons of Larry Shehady to be a legitimate -- and important -- subject for a news story.
In part this is because Shehady is a long-time community leader. As a 100-year-old man who built a business empire, as a philanthropist, his affairs are -- for good or ill -- of interest to many readers. Anyone who has sought out success in a public arena recognizes that it carries with it a certain amount of attention that lesser mortals need not worry about.
(Further evidence of this is seen in the statistics we gather showing which stories are most popular on fresnobee.com. "Fracture in the family" had an unusually high number of hits on Sunday and remains on our top-five list a day later -- a sign of an unusually strong reader response.)
Beyond this, however, the story is the public's business because it involves a public agency spending public resources to take action in a public forum -- the courts.
As for the suggestion that we should have devoted more of the front page to Tuesday's primary, I must point out that we have had stories about the primary on the front page virtually every day for weeks -- including on Sunday. I think a fair analysis of our coverage would conclude that it has been more than thorough.
Senior Vice President & Executive Editor
Managing Editor
Assistant Managing Editor for Presentation
Assistant Managing Editor for News
Senior Editor
Editorial Art Director
South Valley Bureau Chief
Director of Photography
Features Editor
Metro Editor
Business Editor
News Editor
Head Librarian
Interactive Media Editor
Sports Editor
Comments
While you might think your story was worthy for front page news, I found it to be in poor taste. There is no perfect family. And of course, no perfect newspaper. I am referring to the continuing article next to Shehadey's regarding the Super Bowl "Perfection" was not on the Back Page, but to be found on Page A15! Interestingly, an article promoting goodwill from our community "Fresnans heading to Afganistan" was buried 4 pages into the Local Section. Why would you even consider the Shehadey Family laundry more news worthy than this?
Posted by: Mary Avila | February 11, 2008 10:01 AM
I'm sure the strategy of a periodical company is equivalent to the strategy of all entertainment. What the public wants to hear, watch and talk about is valuable enough for a journalist to take the time to write it. So, the fact that there is time taken to print and reprint about a particular story plainly states that there is public interest. We would obviously hear more about petty celebrity lifestyles as if there was some level of community importance, but people want more on Shehady at the moment.
Posted by: Jeannie Vargas | April 24, 2008 6:34 PM