3 ms·

Betteridge's law of headlines.

dalke 14y ago
Nope. You can't knee-jerk exclaim "Betteridge's law" when you see a "?". It's meant for news articles. This article is an introspective "life story" article and doesn't meet the preconditions. For example, the previous life story article ending with a question mark on Salon was "Can I date a Republican?", and the clear answer from the article is "yes." The one before that is "Should the terminally ill control their deaths?" and the author's statement is "A year after my mother's uncomfortable decline, it's a question with which I'm still wrestling", but it's clear that the author supports people learning more about the options for palliative care over attempts at staying alive for as long as possible. I'll put this as a "yes." Then there's the quoted question '“Are you on the cover of a magazine?”', where the answer is definitely "yes", but this too doesn't fit Betteridge's law. And "Was I selfish to have fertility treatments?", where the author states "I honestly don’t think my choice was any more selfish than anyone’s choice to have a child." So that's a "no." But there wa s a while when she worried about the question. I think you get the idea.
- freshhawk 14y ago
  In the case of Betteridge's Law the point being made is that if someone has actual evidence then the headline reflects the evidence. It states the fact that there is new knowledge about something. If it's just speculation or useless fluff then they add a question mark. And yes, it was not made for opinion pieces or personal narratives and, like in the examples you give, doesn't generally work in these situations. My intention was just to point out that it happens to apply here because the headline is childish link bait. The author covers in the piece that it wasn't really porn that lead to this and it's not going to be "forever" either if he does something about it.
  - dalke 14y ago
    I can't tell from your response if you think that Betteridge's Law applies here or not. Betteridge's Law describes articles where an author wants to write a specific story but doesn't have the information to back up the point, and/or doesn't want to do the research to get that information. That doesn't apply here, because "if he does something about it" is a different cause than not having enough information. It looks like you say that it "happens to apply here" because 1) the answer is no, and 2) it's "childish link bait." Why not then just say "No. This is childish link bait."? Suppose the NM governor wrote an op-ed piece "Should I stay the death penalty?", which outlines her ongoing thoughts both for and against commuting the sentence for the last two people on NM's death row. Suppose you are ardently pro-death penalty, support RepealTheRepeal, and believe that only fools would be against it. You could quite justifiably answer "no" to that headline and believe the title to be "childish link bait." But you would be wrong to say that Betteridge's Law applies.
    - freshhawk 14y ago
      Betteridges's "Law" doesn't apply to stories like this for all the reasons you stated. I referenced it because all the critiques of writing that Betteridge's Law implies apply here. I think the misunderstanding here is that you are looking Betteridge's Law as more of a pseudo-law that has specific constraints and I'm looking at is as shorthand for a specific critique of bad writing, which I think does apply here even though, as you stated, it was not created to apply to personal writing. The difference is that most of the examples you are giving of personal writing are subjective and/or value judgements that have no factual answer to the headline question. This one does have an answer, the answer is "no" and the author knew the answer was "no". Anyway, clearly a better comment for me to have made would have been "Although it doesn't apply here this post makes me think of Betteridge's Law!" but it's much less pithy.

dalke 14y ago

Nope. You can't knee-jerk exclaim "Betteridge's law" when you see a "?". It's meant for news articles. This article is an introspective "life story" article and doesn't meet the preconditions. For example, the previous life story article ending with a question mark on Salon was "Can I date a Republican?", and the clear answer from the article is "yes." The one before that is "Should the terminally ill control their deaths?" and the author's statement is "A year after my mother's uncomfortable decline, it's a question with which I'm still wrestling", but it's clear that the author supports people learning more about the options for palliative care over attempts at staying alive for as long as possible. I'll put this as a "yes." Then there's the quoted question '“Are you on the cover of a magazine?”', where the answer is definitely "yes", but this too doesn't fit Betteridge's law. And "Was I selfish to have fertility treatments?", where the author states "I honestly don’t think my choice was any more selfish than anyone’s choice to have a child." So that's a "no." But there wa s a while when she worried about the question. I think you get the idea.

freshhawk 14y ago
In the case of Betteridge's Law the point being made is that if someone has actual evidence then the headline reflects the evidence. It states the fact that there is new knowledge about something. If it's just speculation or useless fluff then they add a question mark. And yes, it was not made for opinion pieces or personal narratives and, like in the examples you give, doesn't generally work in these situations. My intention was just to point out that it happens to apply here because the headline is childish link bait. The author covers in the piece that it wasn't really porn that lead to this and it's not going to be "forever" either if he does something about it.
- dalke 14y ago
  I can't tell from your response if you think that Betteridge's Law applies here or not. Betteridge's Law describes articles where an author wants to write a specific story but doesn't have the information to back up the point, and/or doesn't want to do the research to get that information. That doesn't apply here, because "if he does something about it" is a different cause than not having enough information. It looks like you say that it "happens to apply here" because 1) the answer is no, and 2) it's "childish link bait." Why not then just say "No. This is childish link bait."? Suppose the NM governor wrote an op-ed piece "Should I stay the death penalty?", which outlines her ongoing thoughts both for and against commuting the sentence for the last two people on NM's death row. Suppose you are ardently pro-death penalty, support RepealTheRepeal, and believe that only fools would be against it. You could quite justifiably answer "no" to that headline and believe the title to be "childish link bait." But you would be wrong to say that Betteridge's Law applies.
  - freshhawk 14y ago
    Betteridges's "Law" doesn't apply to stories like this for all the reasons you stated. I referenced it because all the critiques of writing that Betteridge's Law implies apply here. I think the misunderstanding here is that you are looking Betteridge's Law as more of a pseudo-law that has specific constraints and I'm looking at is as shorthand for a specific critique of bad writing, which I think does apply here even though, as you stated, it was not created to apply to personal writing. The difference is that most of the examples you are giving of personal writing are subjective and/or value judgements that have no factual answer to the headline question. This one does have an answer, the answer is "no" and the author knew the answer was "no". Anyway, clearly a better comment for me to have made would have been "Although it doesn't apply here this post makes me think of Betteridge's Law!" but it's much less pithy.