4 ms·
I was expecting things like "woman was hit by a car" to be replaced by "A car hit a woman" (prefer active voice). Instead it refers to pedestrians as Vulnerabl
by csense 5y ago
I was expecting things like "woman was hit by a car" to be replaced by "A car hit a woman" (prefer active voice).
Instead it refers to pedestrians as Vulnerable Road Users. It says the information that "alcohol was not a factor" is a "Distracting counterfactual. Readers place more blame on victims when articles use more counterfactual statements. Counterfactuals also obscure the systemic nature of incidents and place unreasonable burden on individuals."
I thought this would be an automated grammar assistant for basic English writing techniques you should have learned in high school. It's not. Instead, it's a tool for injecting bias into reporting.
- sagarm 5y agoIt's a tool for correcting bias. The corrected version of "woman was hit by a car" (key actor not even mentioned) and "alcohol was not a factor" (unmentioned driver did nothing wrong) is "driver hits woman in unlit crosswalk, third casualty at this intersection this year." The former statements don't challenge the status quo of deadly infrastructure. The latter statement does. Making the driver visible makes it clear to readers that drive that the story isn't one just about other people: they, too, could be doing everything right but still hurt someone.