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You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/23/opinion/montana-judge-incest-sentencing-liz-spayd-new-york-times-public-editor.html
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| Call It What It Is: Rape | Call It What It Is: Rape |
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| The state of Montana doesn’t often make the national news. But it did recently when a judge there sentenced a man to just 60 days in jail after he repeatedly raped his 12-year-old daughter. In the three weeks since the sentence was issued, over 80,000 people have signed an initiative seeking to have the judge impeached. | The state of Montana doesn’t often make the national news. But it did recently when a judge there sentenced a man to just 60 days in jail after he repeatedly raped his 12-year-old daughter. In the three weeks since the sentence was issued, over 80,000 people have signed an initiative seeking to have the judge impeached. |
| The New York Times’s Express desk caught up to the news on Friday, but it put a headline on its story that drew its own protests: “Montana Judge Criticized for 60-Day Sentence for Man Who Has Sex With His Preteen Daughter.” | The New York Times’s Express desk caught up to the news on Friday, but it put a headline on its story that drew its own protests: “Montana Judge Criticized for 60-Day Sentence for Man Who Has Sex With His Preteen Daughter.” |
| In the view of many Times readers, that was a poor attempt to sum up the story. Among them was Elizabeth DeHoff, who honed in on the problem with the headline: | In the view of many Times readers, that was a poor attempt to sum up the story. Among them was Elizabeth DeHoff, who honed in on the problem with the headline: |
| DeHoff, of Littleton, Colo., articulates well the concerns of many of the readers who emailed me on Friday. Editors were clearly struggling with the headline, changing it five times over the course of the day. About three hours after the initial headline went up, a new one was put on the story, getting a little closer to the mark, but clunky: “Montana Judge Criticized for 60-Day Sentence for Man for Incest With Daughter, 12.” Finally, after three more tries, the headline read: “Montana Judge Is Criticized for 60-Day Incest Sentence.” (Still later, the headline was changed again, to “Outrage Follows 60-Day Sentence in Incest Case Against Father of Girl, 12.”) | DeHoff, of Littleton, Colo., articulates well the concerns of many of the readers who emailed me on Friday. Editors were clearly struggling with the headline, changing it five times over the course of the day. About three hours after the initial headline went up, a new one was put on the story, getting a little closer to the mark, but clunky: “Montana Judge Criticized for 60-Day Sentence for Man for Incest With Daughter, 12.” Finally, after three more tries, the headline read: “Montana Judge Is Criticized for 60-Day Incest Sentence.” (Still later, the headline was changed again, to “Outrage Follows 60-Day Sentence in Incest Case Against Father of Girl, 12.”) |
| Those were improvements but, in my view, they still fell short of the mark. | Those were improvements but, in my view, they still fell short of the mark. |
| To understand the thinking behind the headline changes, I spoke with Patrick LaForge, the editor who oversees the Express desk, which aims to get news from around the country up on the Times site quickly. “After the story was published early this morning, a number of editors and readers rightly objected to that language,” LaForge said. “After some discussion, the headline and lead paragraphs were revised to more clearly specify the charge. Please offer apologies and thanks to the readers who pointed this out. We’ve had a thorough conversation with the editors who were involved.” | To understand the thinking behind the headline changes, I spoke with Patrick LaForge, the editor who oversees the Express desk, which aims to get news from around the country up on the Times site quickly. “After the story was published early this morning, a number of editors and readers rightly objected to that language,” LaForge said. “After some discussion, the headline and lead paragraphs were revised to more clearly specify the charge. Please offer apologies and thanks to the readers who pointed this out. We’ve had a thorough conversation with the editors who were involved.” |
| I appreciate, and suspect readers appreciate, LaForge’s acknowledgment of a mistake in judgment and the effort to rectify it. But while the headline improved when it backed off the idea that this was simply “sex,” in my view the final headline still didn’t go far enough by merely referring to “incest.” After all, the word incest to many readers might imply sex with a blood relative that is quite possibly consensual. Several other news sites didn’t hesitate to label this “rape” in their headline, among them CBS News, Time, The Washington Post and New York magazine. | |
| The challenge for headline writers in this case was that the man sentenced pleaded guilty to a charge of incest. So the safe thing to do is just stick to that word. | The challenge for headline writers in this case was that the man sentenced pleaded guilty to a charge of incest. So the safe thing to do is just stick to that word. |
| But there should come a point in the headline-writing process when common sense kicks in. People are enraged because by any reasonable reading of the news story, a man raped a preteen girl, repeatedly, and he’ll spend two months in jail for it. The prosecutor used the word “rape” in court. The Times should have, too. | But there should come a point in the headline-writing process when common sense kicks in. People are enraged because by any reasonable reading of the news story, a man raped a preteen girl, repeatedly, and he’ll spend two months in jail for it. The prosecutor used the word “rape” in court. The Times should have, too. |