Northern Ireland unites in mourning Catholic police officer

http://www.latimes.com/features/religion/la-fg-ireland-police14-2009mar14,0,758972.story

Northern Ireland unites in mourning Catholic police officer

First off. This story is really disheartening :( I feel for the people of Northern Ireland.

That being said, I really appreciate the lead here. This story has two key aspects that it bounces back and forth between: The actual death of Carroll and what it means for the police force and Northern Ireland as a whole. I can tell for sure that this is an effective lead because when I read the lead, I knew all the W's...the lead was well-written and it captures both the levels that this story works on. Last semester? I probably would have read this and not thought twice about it. But now that I have tried to write my own leads...i really appreciate what a thorough lead this is.

The following three paragraphs are a perfect example of the "inverted pyramid" explained in Harrower's book...The first paragraph of the story is an overview of the conflict in Northern Ireland, the next paragraph focuses the story further by explaining the police situation. The third paragraph focuses the story even further by explaining the murder, and then the fourth paragraph specifically addresses Carroll. The rest of the story is mostly details, and is a lot less organized then the first few paragraphs. In fact, I feel like it jumps around too much in some places and can be hard for the readers to follow.

Also, the most prominent piece of news is Carroll's murder, yet the murder itself wasn't explained until 2/3 of the way through the article. I feel like the writer could have focused more on Carroll's murder and then moved to the effects of it, so the reader is not wondering what happened to Carroll.

A few things I really appreciated were: first, the quotes. The quotes were meaningful and effective, and the sources were worthwhile. I don't feel like any quotes were wasted. Also, I don't think the story has any holes. It definitely covers a wide range of subject matter in such a concise story.

A few things that i think could have been done better include: run-ons. I know it sounds stupid, and that it's hard to cram everything into a sentence without creating run-ons, but sentences, like:

“So it was that hundreds of mourners from across the political and religious divide filled a church Friday in the town of Banbridge to pay their last respects to the first officer of the revamped force to be gunned down by a republican splinter group opposed to Northern Ireland's peace process.”

are hard to follow. Reading this in one foul swoop, without any breaks? My brain needs a rest to handle all this! can I get a period somewhere?

There are a lot of complicated, compound sentences like this in the article. In my opinion, it makes it seem rushed and cluttered. But at the same time, how do you include all the information in the article in a concise manner without these compound run-ons? Any ideas?

Overall, I thought it was a well-written piece, but could have been focused a little more.

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Peace

oh… and some inspiration for you all: “if you don’t become the ocean you’ll be seasick every day,” Leonard Cohen

Lawsuit over gay-marriage speech at L.A. City College spurs reactions

http://www.latimes.com/features/religion/la-me-speech3-2009mar03,0,1664982.story

Yo yo. Okay, so I've read this article three times. I even printed it out to make notes, but I am STILL having trouble piecing it altogether. I think the main problem comes from a lack of focus if you're not sure what i mean, here's a subheading from the article,

"protestors back the student who claims his professor reacted badly to his religion-related stance against same-sex unions; a gay unity club forms; a New York man gets misdirected death threats."

Already, in that one sentence is three different (yet related topics) The article jumps back and forth between these topics sporadically. Almost as sporadically as the sources. Although relevant, diverse sources were used, there were a total of eight different sources! And the article jumped back and forth between these sources. while I appreciate the large range of sources, it got super confusing to keep track of who was who. For example, Carl Friedlander, president of the L.A. City College faculty union, was mentioned once in the middle of the article briefly, then was mentioned again briefly five paragraphs later. When I got to that point I was like...wait, who's Friedlander? I had forgotten all about him and had to look back.

I feel like this article needed a glossary of sources at the back! It got so confusing, one source was mentioned, then another, then two pages later it would go back to a random source. Yikes.

And the lead was as follows:

"Los Angeles City College student Ruben Rivera started a campus group last month called Rainbow Alliance, a gay unity club he hopes will be a haven for anybody who feels different."

That would have been a perfect lead if it were about his club, but the article is about Jonathan Lopez's law suit, so it was kind of misleading.

Another point worth mentioning:

"Lopez turned down an interview request, Matteson did not respond to e-mails, and French said he did not know enough about the speech to detail it."

So, basically, the three key players in the article did not have much say.

Finally, I feel like the article paints a very sour picture of Christians. Although the hate speech from Lopez was unwarranted and uncalled for, not all Christians hate gays...As a Christian who supports gay marriage, I think it would have been nice to have a source or two in there who were Christian but were against the hateful protesting.

So, quick summary!

What was pretty sweet...
- A lot of diverse, reliable sources
- A lot of different perspectives
- A lot of interesting, colorful details to the story

What was pretty sour...
- lead was weak and ineffective
- sources were scattered
- not very good focus through out the paper
- Attempts to present balanced view, but doesn't quite do it.

I feel like I had a lot of negative things to say about this particular article...
I'd appreciate any additional feedback: Did anyone feel the same about it? Anyone found some more good stuff in there?

SO I've decided now that I'm going to end each of my posts with a joke/quote...(I tend to blabber a lot...so if you make it to the end, you get a reward!) So, even though the code of ethics would disagree, I think its funny, and I love Oscar Wilde. So here's my quote for you:

"Bad manners make a journalist" -Oscar Wilde

Have a grooooovy day!

Peace