Attention, PR people: there’s no easier way to get me royally pissed off than to be condescending to me.

“Do you cover education a lot?” she said in a tone usually reserved for telling four-year-olds about why leaves fall off trees in the winter. Yep, that would be my job. “Have you ever heard of [the flak’s extremely prominent group, heard of by most 12-year-olds]?” Yep, dipshit, I’ve interviewed your boss a few times. “When I say ‘vouchers,’ do you understand what I’m talking about? Have you heard that term before?” You bet, you empty-headed fool. When I say ‘too stupid to tie your shoes,’ do you understand what I’m talking about? “Do you know what I mean when I say ‘high-stakes testing’?” “You probably don’t know this, but teachers don’t make very much money.” Etc., etc., etc. I kept waiting for her to gently let me know the sun rises in the east, or that there’s this fellow named Bush who’s president.

There are some wonderful PR folks out there, of course — intelligent, interested in their subject, with a good sense of what makes news and what doesn’t. But any reporter with more than a week on the job knows that they make up a small percentage of the field. Most are bubble-skulled idiots who know how to dress up real nice for the cameras but couldn’t explain a complex issue if their 401(k) depended on it. They’re the folks who stumbled into writing press releases because they flunked News Writing 101 in college.

If you’re brilliant — a scientist, an author, a professor — you can get away with being condescending to me. If you’re talking to me about a subject I know nothing about, you can (sometimes) get away with being condescending to me. If you’re a 22-year-old pretty-faced moron who doesn’t know her Manolo Blahniks from a hole in the ground, shut the fuck up and transfer me to someone with a clue.

31 May 2002

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