JOURNALIST /ˈjərnl-ist/ n. a person who writes for newspapers or magazines or prepares news to be broadcast on radio or television (addendum: this person also has to possess the ability to know when their chain is being yanked).
Over at San Francisco's KTVU, a news report concerning the names of the pilots who flew Asiana flight 214 which crashed and burned on the runway at the SFO airport last week, was broadcast out to the viewing public. Now, normally this wouldn't have been a big deal, I mean, all a journalist would have to do for the story would be to call and get the names of the pilots, verify those names via several sources and then comfortably release them to the public knowing that what they were reporting was factual.
But did KTVU do that?
Nope.
Instead they took the word of a summer intern over at the NTSB (question: Don't news organizations already have trusted sources within various organizations like NTSB?) who overheard the names from someone (which is apparently good enough for KTVU) and then, over the television air waves, said the following names OUT LOUD without any hint of surprise:
Captain Sum Ting Wong
Wi Tu Lo
Ho Lee Fuk
Bang Ding Ow
Ah yes, well done journalists, well done.
After the break is the actual news report.
Feel free to weep over the blatant racism, I know I did.
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