OT - John Wall's Father Story - Did journalist go too far?

[lime470]

What about Derrick Rose what happened to his Father ???????? he always talks about his Mother and Family.

Derrick Roses - Father was a Rose seller during the day and a Crack dealer at night
i want to know where his father is ??

[Grand Champ]

Oh and i'm sure he'll cry himself to sleep at night on his pillow stuffed with hundred dollar bills just fine

Why are you so obsessed with the money these stars make, and think they shouldn't have emotions just like any other normal human just because they have money? Money doesn't buy everything.

no but it sure makes things a lot easier to deal with

[DFolks]

What about Derrick Rose what happened to his Father ???????? he always talks about his Mother and Family.

Derrick Roses - Father was a Rose seller during the day and a Crack dealer at night
i want to know where his father is ??

lies

[DaeDae]

Oh and i'm sure he'll cry himself to sleep at night on his pillow stuffed with hundred dollar bills just fine

Why are you so obsessed with the money these stars make, and think they shouldn't have emotions just like any other normal human just because they have money? Money doesn't buy everything.

no but it sure makes things a lot easier to deal with

That is utter nonsense. Spoken like someone who obviosly has never had enough money to realize, there are some things that money simply cannot fix. Like being told for the 8th time today, that "I've never seen anything like this before" when a doctor examines the region of your body that Cancer has been ravaging.

[Grand Champ]

no but it sure makes things a lot easier to deal with

That is utter nonsense. Spoken like someone who obviosly has never had enough money to realize, there are some things that money simply cannot fix. Like being told for the 8th time today, that "I've never seen anything like this before" when a doctor examines the region of your body that Cancer has been ravaging.

Why is cancer treatment free now?


THANKS BARACK!

[DaeDae]

no but it sure makes things a lot easier to deal with

That is utter nonsense. Spoken like someone who obviosly has never had enough money to realize, there are some things that money simply cannot fix. Like being told for the 8th time today, that "I've never seen anything like this before" when a doctor examines the region of your body that Cancer has been ravaging.

Why is cancer treatment free now?


THANKS BARACK!

No it isn't. Not when its terminal.

[Grand Champ]

well i'm very sorry to hear you have bad cancer, but you kinda just proved my point

[JohnnyKILLroy]

Rose has no father, God himself placed a baby Unicorn inside hi mama's Whooha.

[DaeDae]

well i'm very sorry to hear you have bad cancer, but you kinda just proved my point

Who said I was talking about me? I've overcome cancer. My VERY WELL OFF friend. Not so much. One of the last things he said to me was that he would gladly give back all the money he had made, to be in my shoes......there are some things, that money simply cannot buy. Peace of mind, when you know you are dying, while an extreme example, is just one of many.

[League Circles]

This journalist is a POS IMO. I know he had every right to do what he did, but we have every right to do a lot of bad things that we shouldn't do IMO. This journalist made a concerted effort to go find a young man in a public place and tell him some very troubling and upsetting things about his family. If you're going to tell a guy something like that because you're writing some pathetic human interest sports article for bitches to read, at least do it in private like a man. Just pathetic if you ask me. It's never OK to recklessly ignore someone's feelings like that when they've done no relevant wrong and there is no notable good to come or a valid reason. This was done by the journalist just based on his (extremely lame) perception that this topic (him toying with Wall's emotions over his POS father aand then writing about it like a true bitch) would sell enough articles or ads or whatever to justify the obvious moral hazard. The writer is a loser and I'm glad I didn't click on the link.

[theagent]

ummm can someone tell me how shooting a person in the head is only "second-degree murder"????????

c'mon ussc overturn that ban

[Flight 23]

Shame on Wall's family for putting their boy in that situation. They should have told him instead of just hoping the media never found out -- which was going to be a no-brainer unless his family is just stupid or something.

[sdhoops]

Shame on Wall's family for putting their boy in that situation. They should have told him instead of just hoping the media never found out -- which was going to be a no-brainer unless his family is just stupid or something.

Exactly. This was a terrible way to find out about this. I can understand withholding such information for a few years until he could fully understand such a thing. But 19/20 years old now and is just finding out for the first time now? Unbelievable...

[The 6ft Hurdle]

Shame on Wall's family for putting their boy in that situation. They should have told him instead of just hoping the media never found out -- which was going to be a no-brainer unless his family is just stupid or something.

Exactly. This was a terrible way to find out about this. I can understand withholding such information for a few years until he could fully understand such a thing. But 19/20 years old now and is just finding out for the first time now? Unbelievable...

But then again, when exactly is the perfect time to talk about this?

I love when white male journalists tell single black moms what they need to be doing.

Some parts of the article were intriguing, but overall, not impressed with how its framed as if John Wall should get a new role model, like he should disown his dad or something.

I don't think it's the journalists' place to moralize the situation, much less dig for or spill this information in a public interview and then go out of his way to write an article about it, least until he's spoken about it with the family. Tactless and shows little respect for the rest of the family.

Seems like the journalist thought he was some kind of expose artist as if John Wall was covering up something. His mom might've not told him but she probably had her reasons. Maybe she didn't want him dwelling on it. Who knows what the mom's motives for not talking about it are. Having raised him on her own, seems like she should've retained the right to tell him family business personally and not through some awkward ass interaction with some journalist. It's one thing exposing public figures in their public duties, it's quite another to expose public figures' quasi-private family matters.

[Scott May]

Here's a follow-up interview with the author in which he gives more details about how, when, and why he broke the news to Wall. Here's the nut graph, from a journalistic perspective (bolding mine):

To be honest, i wanted to write the most comprehensive story ever written on John. I wanted to be fair, thorough and detailed. When you do a 3,500-word profile of someone, and you write about their prime motivation and inspiration, you need to disclose why that person was in jail for most of the final 30 years of their life. I don't think that is up for debate. If one wants to debate how I handled it, fine. But I do feel comfortable with how I handled it. I did not ambush anyone or blindside anyone. I didn't mention court records, the victim's name, any of that. I wanted to be sensitive and delicate and respectful. I was not comfortable with the situation I was in, but I feel I made the right decision.

http://www.bulletsforever.com/2010/6/21 ... o-bf-about

6FTH, I would probably agree with your take on any given issue 99/100, but I don't see any moralizing here. I'd say the piece even portrays Wall's mom semi-heroically--someone put in a bad situation doing the absolute best that she can. I'm not getting your idea that the author is suggesting Wall should get a new role model. And somehow I don't think you'd be any more comfortable with the reporter telling Wall's mom, "You tell him, or I will."

This guy's boss told him to go out and write a definitive profile of John Wall. A huge part of John Wall's story is that his father was in prison for his whole life and that he died young. The writer simply researched why Wall's dad was in prison for all of his adult life and found out it was mostly because he killed a young wife and mother. He had to report that. He told Wall about his findings in a private conversation before the article was published. It doesn't seem to have affected Wall in any meaningful fashion.

[The 6ft Hurdle]

6FTH, I would probably agree with your take on any given issue 99/100, but I don't see any moralizing here.

I know the feeling Scott. Disagreeing with you actually feels like disagreeing with one of my best friends who is politically conscious who has a few things I don't agree with and we would shut up about. Kinda didn't want to see what came of the thread.

This would be so much easier if you were just Bullsville or Ron Cey.

To be honest, i wanted to write the most comprehensive story ever written on John. I wanted to be fair, thorough and detailed. When you do a 3,500-word profile of someone, and you write about their prime motivation and inspiration, you need to disclose why that person was in jail for most of the final 30 years of their life. I don't think that is up for debate. If one wants to debate how I handled it, fine. But I do feel comfortable with how I handled it. I did not ambush anyone or blindside anyone. I didn't mention court records, the victim's name, any of that. I wanted to be sensitive and delicate and respectful. I was not comfortable with the situation I was in, but I feel I made the right decision.

I'd say the piece even portrays Wall's mom semi-heroically--someone put in a bad situation doing the absolute best that she can. I'm not getting your idea that the author is suggesting Wall should get a new role model. And somehow I don't think you'd be any more comfortable with the reporter telling Wall's mom, "You tell him, or I will."

This guy's boss told him to go out and write a definitive profile of John Wall. A huge part of John Wall's story is that his father was in prison for his whole life and that he died young. The writer simply researched why Wall's dad was in prison for all of his adult life and found out it was mostly because he killed a young wife and mother. He had to report that. He told Wall about his findings in a private conversation before the article was published. It doesn't seem to have affected Wall in any meaningful fashion.

The piece is semi-heroic towards the mom, I agree.

But where it suddenly got all uncomfortably moralistically paternalistic for me were in two things: the title of the piece which reads like this "despite being a big-time flub-up, John Wall reveres dad", which strikes me as a curious title that could have been refined and second, the part where he wrote that Wall's mom "simply didn't talk about it" and when he later seemed to ignore that fact or apparently didn't question why.

I was about to write that I think it is within bounds to ask family members about his motivation and inspiration. That's perfectly acceptable.

Where I think he crossed a boundary was all in how he handled divulging such information, but unlike Eric, I don't think that's any minor thing on some huge cumbersome list of things to get right.

The way he talked about it was within the flow of conversation makes it seem a little more reasonable than ambushing him out of nowhere.

However, I think he could have held back from volunteering such information and at least asking his family about it first. Maybe he would have to do it in a "you tell him or I tell him" way, but at the very minimum involving the family in such a decision would have been a lot more respectful. Definitely not the most direct or convenient way to approach things particularly when you're on deadlines, but I think would have been much more tactful and respectable.

I guess this was all going to surface one way or another, but I think if he was so conflicted as he mentioned in the interview, he had an opportunity to think about it and get it right, and IMHO, blew it.

[KingoftheCastle]

But then again, when exactly is the perfect time to talk about this?

.

Father's Day ?

[DuckIII]

This would be so much easier if you were just Bullsville or Ron Cey.

Gratuitous.

[The 6ft Hurdle]

This would be so much easier if you were just Bullsville or Ron Cey.

Gratuitous.

It was a joking truth. I respect any new thing you and Bullsville have to say but I think we've disagreed so much that I also expect not to agree with you on a lot of things.

[Scott May]

But where it suddenly got all uncomfortably moralistically paternalistic for me were in two things: the title of the piece which reads like this "despite being a big-time flub-up, John Wall reveres dad", which strikes me as a curious title that could have been refined and second, the part where he wrote that Wall's mom "simply didn't talk about it" and when he later seemed to ignore that fact or apparently didn't question why.

The odds are that an editor wrote the headline, FWIW. It's a frequent source of dissension in the newsroom, headlines not jibing with a story. I agree with you about the second part, but on the other hand, THAT ("why didn't you tell him? Ever?") is an insanely personal, uncomfortable question. Plus, I think we can all pretty much understand her motives: Wall clearly idolized his dad from an early age, the weekend visits may have been all that was holding his life together, and at that point and time, there was only downside in letting him know the specifics.

I was about to write that I think it is within bounds to ask family members about his motivation and inspiration. That's perfectly acceptable.

Where I think he crossed a boundary was all in how he handled divulging such information, but unlike Eric, I don't think that's any minor thing on some huge cumbersome list of things to get right.

The way he talked about it was within the flow of conversation makes it seem a little more reasonable than ambushing him out of nowhere.

However, I think he could have held back from volunteering such information and at least asking his family about it first. Maybe he would have to do it in a "you tell him or I tell him" way, but at the very minimum involving the family in such a decision would have been a lot more respectful. Definitely not the most direct or convenient way to approach things particularly when you're on deadlines, but I think would have been much more tactful and respectable.

I guess this was all going to surface one way or another, but I think if he was so conflicted as he mentioned in the interview, he had an opportunity to think about it and get it right, and IMHO, blew it.

I actually agree with a lot of what you've written here. Certainly I would have gone about it differently if I'd written the piece. But I do think he has a fairly solid defense from a journalistic standpoint -- it's honestly inconceivable that no one had found this out until now. I think that he just let his professional side get ahead of his human-being side.