[ back ]
Heavy reporting exposes 'Light'
(by Dave Lange - February 03, 2010)
COUNTY LINE, BY DAVE LANGE
Heavy reporting exposes 'Light'
On most days, if you're into anonymity and the fakery that frequently accompanies it, you can open up Cleveland's daily newspaper to Page 2 and get a dose of letters penned by unnamed originators.
So I found it interesting last week when the same editors who encourage those anonymous opinions found the saga of a prolific letter writer going by the name of "Ellie Light" to be so newsworthy that they gave it front-page coverage on two separate days.
According to the dubious reports, Ms. Light, who eventually was identified as Winston Steward, of Frazier Park, Calif., had gotten his or her letter in support of President Barack Obama published in at least 40 newspapers around the country. In addition to the pseudonym, Mr. Steward was able to accomplish this feat by using various false places of residence within the various publication areas.
In addition to poking fun at some well-known newspapers elsewhere, the Cleveland paper proudly reported the fact that it had not been similarly duped into printing the letter. So I presume I'm entitled to do the same, although it's not front-page news. Yes, I also received the letter signed by Ellie Light, which began by emphasizing the problems that Mr. Obama inherited from his predecessor when he took office a year ago, and I did not print it.
In the letter I received by e-mail, the writer identified herself as a Chagrin Falls resident. I e-mailed her back, noting that she had neglected to provide our required telephone number for verification purposes. The next day, she sent me a phone number with an unfamiliar area code, which isn't all that unusual with the proliferation of cell phones. I called the number and got a recording of a man's voice, which didn't sound like Ellie. I told him or her to call me back for verification and, being somewhat suspicious by then, added that I would need his or her street address. He or she never called back.
That would have been the end of my story -- if Ellie Light, aka Winston Steward, hadn't become front-page news in Cleveland.
Aside from the braggadocio about not getting tricked, the Cleveland paper sought to justify its high-profile coverage of the nonexistent Ellie Light's letter-writing campaign because of the heavy traffic the story had generated online. It does seem strange, if not grossly hypocritical, for a fake-named letter writer to be the subject of so much Internet chatter. From the vantage point of their own anonymity, some of those chatterers actually speculated that Ellie Light could be Barack or Michelle Obama or somebody on the White House staff. And these people take each other seriously.
Well, here's news for the daily newspaper. Real letters with fake names and fake letters with real names get printed in newspapers every day. Some of them express liberal views, some are conservative, and some are middle of the road -- but only one of those viewpoints has been dissected with such gusto on two front pages by the Cleveland edition of the corporate media.
No matter how careful newspaper editors are in screening letters and how thorough they are in verifying their authenticity, it's impossible to catch every would-be Ellie Light in this world. No newspaper that values genuine public opinion is immune from conniving cowards who vituperate under the shelter of false identification. Those that nurture such behavior via the nameless and shameless sanctums of the Internet should spare us the sanctimony.
[ back ]
