The Facebook Jejeneration

Notes from a lecture to campus journalists from Metro Manila schools on editorial writing at Pasig Elementary School, Pasig City, on Nov. 4, 2010:

Think visual — know where you’re going.

Must be topical, relevant to current headlines or the reading sector concerned. Must always be in context with a bit of history thrown in. Research. Not so much an opinion as it is to help generate opinions. Best editorials never try to impose on reader. Before editorial writing, there is editorial reading.

Sometimes best editorials start with an image, an incident on the street: the objective correlative. Parallel to literature. Only difference: here we are dealing with facts, which are often stranger than fiction.

A no-no: Begging the question leaves the reader more confused. Don’t overstate the obvious, unless for irony or sarcasm.

Strike a balance between newspaper’s stand (vested interest) and writer’s own opinion, with neither side being too obvious. (e.g. tuition fee, school issues.)

It would help to have a philosophical bent, so here is where reading comes in. Beware: tangential approach might also leave reader confused.

Clarity and logic, logic and clarity. Common sense. Commonsense. Brevity.

Concerns of youth in academe

Clean toilets, functioning toilets. Tuition fee, extra charges, out of school youth. Safety of the streets and malls. Premarital sex, RH bill (PMT). Rock and roll and rap battles. Fetuses in chapel. Internet, Dota, juvenile delinquency. Drug use, Tekken, allowances, cellphone use and load. Cafeteria food, street food, schoolyard bullies. Barangay and SK elections, food for school program. Facebook, PNoy, special children, poll duty. Twitter, budget for education, petty crime. All symptomatic of the bigger picture.

Danger of the pooled editorial: a tug-of-war that lead writer has to resolve down to the last typo.

Tell story of man accosting you on street, saying “Sa’n ka na ba?” May kaso sa Pasig, father of triplets, ngayon nakaburol. “’Yung maputi,” names all forgotten.

What does the editorial want from you? In seemingly trying to sell you something you are indirectly advised to keep your money.

Editorial like a complete stranger accosting you on the street. Smell out the subtext. Compare and contrast with past strangers on the street walking up to ask for money.

Irreverence is okay but humor should not be out of place. (re: Ampatuan massacre.)

More things happen in a newsroom than can ever be told in a newspaper. Barrage of news, on different levels, is endless.

Danger of sensory overload, which is why editorial helps pare down news to barest essentials. To destroy everything in order to see what’s left standing.

A singular person’s informed opinion is worth more than a mob’s ranting.

No secret that editorial is atop of “Our Daily Bread” (i.e., in The STAR), the parable or fable for the day.

The best editorials aspire to one day be like a parable or fable. Topical, yes, but somehow eventually breaking down the boundaries of time and, if physics permits, space.

Open drill: pass around chapbook and write a one-sentence informed opinion on a drawing. Where will that sentence be best located in an editorial? Know where you’re going.

Revised notes for a lecture to campus advisers from Metro Manila schools on editorial writing in Pasig Elementary School, Nov. 5, 2010.

Think visual, but just because you know where you’re going, doesn’t mean that you’ve been there before.

Not only must be current, but also relevant and with insight.

A reliable stylebook or manual or dictionary must be constantly at arm’s length. Penguin Dictionary for Writers and Editors. The Associated Press Stylebook 2008. Elements of Style by Strunk and White. Any book on idioms. Philippine Readers.

Please be guided on basic rules of grammar and usage without straitjacketing the style of the aspiring young writer journalist. If an editorial consists solely of questions, or starts and ends on the front page, this is strictly a result of diskarte.

Try to state and restate both sides of the issue, using proper attribution, and take a clear stand at the end. (Beware of inadvertent plagiarism).

The school adviser is often like middle management between school authorities and newspaper staff.

Please double check on common mistakes that last till they reach the newsroom:

• Its and it’s (ng and nang)

• His and hers

• rein in, not reign in

• subject-verb agreement

• diffuse and defuse

• line of site, profit Muhammad

And other unintended puns.

All symptoms of the bigger picture. Encourage independence of thought, better to be the devil’s advocate than kowtow to powers that be.

Key words of transparency and good governance that lose their meaning at the end of the day if not translated into action and actual results. A healthy opposition ensures freedom of expression (the sake sucks), not to forget to give credit where due.

Analogy of the stranger accosting you on the street, could this be the newsboy selling the papers?

Of course not without parting with your money can you read the editorial inside.

Be careful of the Internet, for ye not know what lurks beneath the wonders of technology. The ghost in the machine, invention of the wheel, Frankenstein.

Irreverence is okay but humor should never be out of place. The hardest thing I’ve done at The STAR, or at least one of the most difficult, was having to complete the second part of an editorial whose first part was the only page that made it through the fax.

I had to guess what the writer was driving at and continue her train of thought, all the while making it appear seamless as if only one person were writing the editorial. Like most of these short essays, (sanaysay, kay kelangan may saysay), it was unsigned, because if it had been given a name it would probably be Teenage Mutant Ninja.

Please tell them to know their subject, and not write as if rambling, unless it is a new literary style. Every genre has a place under the sun. K-12, the new hot issue of the day.

Read up on philosophy, drink beer, learn to break the boundaries of time and space and sing praises to Einstein, as well Eisenstein.

Open drill: pass around sample editorials cut in half and try to guess what the other half said. Q & A.

Guide question for editorial writing contest for Metro Manila campus journalists given in Parang Elementary School, Marikina City, Nov. 17, 2010:

School kids today have their own Facebook and Twitter accounts, do research on the Internet, communicate via cell phone, play online games such as Plants and Zombies and Dota. In eight to 10 paragraphs, with each paragraph not more than three sentences long, write an editorial/short essay titled “The Facebook Jejeneration” to justify whether such modern technology can be handled responsibly by the youth.

Keep in mind the keywords in our seminar: clarity, brevity, logic. Please write legibly. Good luck!