I think this story is a test of how easily our sensibilities may be offended. I think the author is merely pointing out the attitude of many white retirees. Others apparently see it differently.
R-J scraps thousands of newspapers
By Joe Schoenmann (schoenmann@vegas.com)
(Editors note: Regular readers of the Weekly know that we rarely comment on other media. But we've found a recent incident that makes it unavoidable.)
If you've ever read The Mercury, little sister to that lumbering, understaffed bastion of conservatism, the Review-Journal, you've probably had an urge to either say "What the hell?" or to just toss the thing out.
Started in January, the paper is the R-J's attempt to tap into that young, educated, upwardly mobile group of readers--loved by advertisers--that the R-J, itself, so perfectly alienates with its worn-out tirades against progressivism.
The problem for some readers is The Mercury's content. Distributed every week wrapped around the R-J's entertainment section, the paper is a mishmash of fake columns, a handful of short stories based on reality, and stories that are completely madeup, but which try to pass as humorous satire. Even the paper's editor, Geoff Schumacher, admitted in a recent column that readers have a hard time figuring out what's real, what's fake and what's supposed to be funny.
Maybe that's part of the reason the newspaper had to scrap an estimated 30,000 papers, the entire run of its Aug. 3 edition, at a cost of thousands of dollars. According to Schumacher, "African-American employees (none of them reporters or editors) of the R-J raised hell on it."
"A group of people came forward and thought it was a racist item," he added. "We had to reprint the entire paper."
The article was headlined: Sun City Anthem residents: 'What's next, blacks?'
Schumacher defended the satirical article as "funny and not racist and fine to go. (But) having heard the concerns, I understand this could be taken in more than one way."
Apparently, not all of the 30,000 papers were destroyed, because one of them found its way to the Weekly's doorstep. Here's the story:
Faced with a recent infestation of rats, frustrated Sun City Anthem residents are learning that life in a master-planned community isn't necessarily immune to the common pitfalls associated with urban living.
"First it was faulty wiring in some of the houses," said 67-year-old resident Wayde Lumner. "Now we've got rats invading our homes. What's next, blacks? Yeah, just what we need. Blacks would be the cherry on top."
Other residents agreed that the planned community hasn't lived up to its hype as a suburban oasis for active retirees.
"It's chaos. The other morning when I went out to pick up the paper, I saw a Mexican man with a leafblower," said Gloria Alders. "You could have told me I was in East L.A., and I would have believed it."
Alders added she has also contacted the homeowners association about the "unkempt vagabond" she saw skateboarding down the street yesterday.
Offensive? To some workers at the Weekly, the story read as just another of The Mercury's strained attempts at satire. But an African-American employee who read the story said the content was offensive. "You've got to consider just what the writers think about blacks to come up with this kind of story," he said. "It's pretty amateur stuff." He also guaranteed that if it the story been printed, there would have been an earnest search for "this Wayde Lumner."
So to some the story was insulting and it pissed them off. But isn't that how satire works? And isn't that what an alternative weekly is supposed to do--challenge readers to think while exposing those human vices and social wrongs that never get a look by the established media?
Schumacher thought so, at least he did when he took the helm of The Mercury. In the first issue, he proclaimed that the paper "may be the most arrogant, pretentious experiment in Las Vegas history." In that same column, he wrote that his aim as editor would be "to provoke a steady stream of 'oh my Gods' from the executive suites on Bonanza Road (site of the R-J)."
"This experiment," he added, "is worth watching to see how it plays out."
Eight months into the experiment, and after the first real test of the R-J's plaything, it appears that the experiment is moving in a direction that is anything but alternative.
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