Basic news stories are pretty bad at pumping up the drama. And the ones that really irritate me for some reason are the stories involving violence, because these are the stories that don’t need any emphasis in order to invoke an empathetic response in a normal person. I’ll add a warning now that this is a just a cranky old man post.
Here are the two that annoy me the most:
- Razor sharp
- Point blank
“Man attacks wife with knife” vs “Man attacks wife with razor sharp knife”. While my first instinct as a blade connoisseur would judge this to be a courtesy (it’d be more efficient and quicker to kill someone with a sharp knife), it’s an unnecessary, and probably inaccurate claim, unless the man were actually trying to murder his wife with a straight razor. Why? Because no blades except razors are sharpened to razor thinness, because most knives would suffer blade longevity for their designated tasks if sharpened that fine. So either 1) the weapon was a shaving razor (some questions arise in my mind were that actually the case, 2) the man actually sharpened a k-bar to a razor (maybe, if the steel could actually hold that edge, or 3) the man used a sushi knife (maybe there were some dinner plan arguments taking place). In all likelihood, the knife wasn’t razor sharp and this was just an attempt to make the story sound scarier.
“Man shoots wife in bedroom” vs “Man shoots wife point blank in bedroom”. (I’m not advocating for wife-killing here-just keeping the story the same for consistency.) First of all, unless the bedroom was the size of a stadium, it’s point blank distance. And even if the bedroom was the size of a stadium, it could still be point blank. A 150 grain 30-06 rifle round has a point blank range of ~300 yards. It should be noted here that point blank means the distance at which the shooter doesn’t have to correct for gravity drop. Now, a contact shot on the other hand means the muzzle was pressed against the victim at the time of shooting, to which I’d agree that if that were true, it might imply more of an emotionally-charged motive. So either the news was wrong or they used the wrong terminology.
Violence is scary enough. I don’t need the emphasis. And if you’re an editor and simply can’t resist, use the right terminology.
If I die by violence, please be accurate.
–Simon