Monday, August 18, 2008
News / News Bites More Trib Losses
Posted by Michael Miner on Mon, Aug 18, 2008 at 5:51 PM
I believe that all of the following took buyouts: Vanessa Bauza, Joe Sjostrom, Jack Pointer, Therese Kwiatkowski, Barbara Rose, Richard Phillips, Kirsten Scharnberg, David Mendell, Dan Gibbard, Ernie Torriero, Wendy White, Hung Vu, Marsha Peters, Brenda Kilianski, Barry Temkin, Alan Sutton, Mark Sharpiro Shapiro, Heather Stone, John Schmeltzer, and Glenn Jeffers. Another considerable loss was that of Nannette Smith, longtime secretary in the features department.
"The Seeker," the blog of Tribune religion writer Manya Brachear, offers the additional name of Nancy Stuermer. Brachear reflects on the layoffs, and she's asked prominent Chicago clergy to speak to "the victims and the vulnerable and the insecure" (Martin Marty's phrase) about the "rupture in self-definition" -- as Rabbi Ellen Dreyfus puts it -- they have just experienced. Having gone through the experience once myself at the Sun-Times, I salute the rabbi on her language.
Of the above former Tribune journalists I'm going to single out Kirsten Scharnberg. A friend who admires her sent me a link to this story about her written a few years ago for her alma mater. As you'll see, she was embedded with the 101st Airborne during the 2003 invasion of Iraq. "Wouldn't even trade a hot shower for it," she said during the assignment.
Comments (11)
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Adding my admiration for Kirsten Scharnberg. I'm a byline watcher, and hers has always been one I've always watched for. I will miss her stories. I hope to read her again someplace.
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Victims? Please. You folks would think that this is the first time in the history of work than people have been bought out or laid off. The true victims, vulnerable and insecure of the world have little, if any sympathy for this situation.
There were 23 people laid off that day who were not in editorial. Do they even get a wink and a nod, or was their career not worth mentioning?
Not to pick at the scab, but it would have been nice if you (or someone -- anyone) had accorded this honor to all the nameless Reader employees who were laid off last year. It wasn't just the marquee writers who suffered (some are still suffering) a "rupture in self-definition."
I grew up addicted to news print -- we had three or four newspapers a day in our house - two in the morning and two in the evening. I printed a household newspaper when I was a about 8. I worked on a new paper in grade school and high school and delivering the newspaper was my first job. I got a journalism major, though it was in the course of getting that major that I self-determined I didn't have the right mindset to be a good journalist, so my career took me elsewhere. Still, I remained addicted to news print for a long time and then, over the past decade, addicted to reading the news from many different sources online. It's disheartening to see the list of people who took the buy-out or were laid off. The Trib will be a lesser paper (as is the Sun-Times). As one who increasingly read the paper online rather than paying 50 cents for it over the last decade, I'm part of the problem, but I'm also part of the solution. My desire for news -- reported honestly and written well -- hasn't abated. The newspapers' business model obviously needed to change, but at the expense of so much talent -- such a waste.
You've included a link to the article I wrote about her as a journalism student in 2003, but I've also been a big fan of Kirsten's work. Her reporting and writing stand out, and I was very sad to hear she'll be gone. I wish her the best.
"Brachear reflects on the layoffs, and she's asked prominent Chicago clergy to speak to "the victims and the vulnerable and the insecure" (Martin Marty's phrase) about the "rupture in self-definition" -- as Rabbi Ellen Dreyfus puts it -- they have just experienced." As with the luvvies of the theater world whose places of work "go dark" rather than shut because nobody wants to watch their gorawful productions, so it is that journos are equally full of self-importance.
Is "luvvies" another way of saying "homosexual," wingnut moron? And what's your opinion of African-Americans, Latinos, Asian-Americans, Native Americans, Jews, women, gays and lesbians--as if we didn't already know? And do you get a hardon every time you watch your idol Loofah Felafel or your other idol Rush Vicodin?
Mark, try opening your mind and eyes before spouting off unnecessary abuse. Just so you know... The term 'luvvie' already existed as a derogatory noun for pretentious, overblown, narcissistic people of an artistic or dramatic bent. Here, this may help you: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Luvvies
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