Yo, Blair and all that shit
By Andrew Grant-Adamson • Jul 18th, 2006 • Category: Journalism, LanguageJim Romenesko, the Poynter Institute’s media blogger, raised the question of the use of the word “shit” in US newspapers yesterday. The context was the open mike conversation between Bush and Blair. He links to Howard Mortman’s blog which says the Washington Post did not censor the exchange, and goes back to a 1973 Nixon transcript for a precedent.
Who cares, and anyway the American media seems as ready to print “shit” the British. A country specific search of Google News found 1,290 uses in the US and 296 in the UK. That is roughly similar when the sizes of the populations are taken into account.
What we really want to know is how many heads of government or state does Bush greet with “Yo”. Is this the outward sign of the “special relationship”?
Andrew Grant-Adamson is Andrew Grant-Adamson is a journalist who now teaches a new generation of writers, subs and editors at the University of Westminster.
Email this author | All posts by Andrew Grant-Adamson
The real issue is not their use of language… it is the matters they are discussing… the fact that Blairs request to start diplomacy in the region is denied.