I recently complained about the way the media “reported” the shootings at Virginia Tech. Mainly, I had a problem with their use of speculative language and opinion rather than fact to emphasize the story.
In a Chron front page story today, I saw this quote written by jouralist Lise Olsen:
On March 26, the Saturday before Easter 2005, Donald W. Smith, a college senior working as a $9.40-an-hour maintenance apprentice at a Bryan chicken plant, was asked to disconnect a heavy motor from a water-chilling unit. Though the production line was shut down that day, the air hung heavy with the scent of chicken guts.
Um, Lise, I really just have one question for you: how exactly do you know what the air smelled like that day? And while I’m at it, “guts?” Really, that’s the word you chose? Is “guts” the technical term?