Dawdy Resigns, Parrish Whines
Today was Philip Dawdy's last day at the Weekly. He resigned last Friday on his own accord. Philip made some tremendous contributions to the paper during his tenure, we're sorry to see him go, and we wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors.
After parting ways in a seemingly amicable manner some three months ago, another ex-Weekly scribe, Geov Parrish, has now taken on the voice of a chest-thumping faux insider whose disdain for the Weekly and its current owners knows no boundaries. The P.I.'s Robert Jamieson flagged the latest Parrish missive in his column today. Parrish is entitled to his opinion. But when contemplating his "insider" cred, let's be clear here: While Parrish was a prolific and sometimes insightful contributor, he was never a full-time staffer, never occupied a desk (at least since I've been here) and hasn't the slightest clue as to what goes on from day-to-day in the Weekly's offices, good or bad.
In person, Parrish is pleasant, intellectual and rather meek. In print, however, he's got 'tude and bravado to burn — and is the sort of armchair quarterback columnist for whom having a colonoscopy might be preferable to picking up the phone. Personally, I can't stand journalists (and people, for that matter) who embody this sort of passive-aggressiveness, but the point here is that the post-mortem musings of disgruntled ex-writers should be taken with a fistful of salt — not as chapter and verse.
Then there's Jamieson. Having to crank out two-plus columns per week is an incredibly daunting job that Jamieson typically handles with aplomb. But phoning in a gossip gatherer type of column without attempting to get some sort of counterweight is stooping to Geovian levels. To Jamieson's credit, he called to discuss his column — after the fact. Here's hoping he calls prior to writing next time.
In spite of all this, the Weekly still employs an incredibly talented, devoted collection of writers and editors who take a great deal of pride in putting out a well-written, dynamic, interesting — and, yes, unpredictable — paper every week. It will only get better, and we thank our readers for sticking with us as we continue to move the ball down the field.
24 comment(s)
Steph says:
That\'s the 2nd entry of yours that uses \"chest thumping\" and \"meek\", and how you don\'t like it when a person is one on the keyboard or not in person...really, no one cares how you judge people.
Chest thumpers and keypounders unite...oh, but I forgot...no one else posts here!
Best not to get defensive here Seely, you may just lose that last reader as a result.
You ever hear of a high road?
Posted On: Tuesday, Nov. 7 2006 @ 6:45PM
mai nomura says:
nice spin, all i know is that in the recent past it took me about an hour to read through the articles that i was interested in. after the ownership change it took maybe 10 minutes before it went into the recycle bin. and dawdy was half of that. i have stopped picking up the weekly a month ago, and see no reason to do so anymore,
unless i need to clean my windows or need packing material. bye!
Posted On: Tuesday, Nov. 7 2006 @ 6:55PM
Steph says:
Just in case I didn\'t make myself clear:
Integrity counts!
Thump.Thump.
Posted On: Tuesday, Nov. 7 2006 @ 7:09PM
Steph says:
So creating a fake cover story is classified as \"unpredictable\"?
I tell ya what, that\'s classified as bullshit.
I\'m not going to go on and on here, but really, instead of a whining entry slamming ex-employees , why not be honest, and show some integrity as an Editor of a paper he wants to save? and see move forward?
You sound like a politician.
Posted On: Tuesday, Nov. 7 2006 @ 7:20PM
craig says:
Hey fuckhead, there\'s an election going on. Or does the weekly not care about important things anymore.
Posted On: Tuesday, Nov. 7 2006 @ 9:14PM
repeater says:
I\'d like to echo that the readable content is about 10% of what it was, and \"Hey fuckhead, there\'s an election going on.\"
Of course Geov wasn\'t a full time staffer - he\'s got his own fucking paper to run asswipe. Fact is, that your statement \"at least since I\'ve been here\" is the operative sentence here - you didn\'t realize that Geov was totally hooked into the entire SW staff...and you weren\'t butthead.
The only whining going on is from you!
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 12:39AM
lurk says:
actually the blurb quoted in J\'s column makes a hell of a point. that idiotic \"cover story\" was a waste of both newsprint and pixels. would have been better told as a four-panel cartoon.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 2:58AM
A Real Journalist says:
It\'s no secret that you\'re Mike Lacey\'s pet rat and though it\'s hard to tell from your silly and showy hip-hop patois what exactly your point is, it\'s nonetheless unpardonable that you make medical jokes about a guy whose medical problems at times left him fighting for his life. Geov\'s comments on LAObserved were accurate and fair. Geov likely knows more about the Weekly than you do, has contributed more to its success than you and the stories he wrote weren\'t made up - how ironic that YOU use the word faux!
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 6:25AM
Seely says:
There's nothing belittling anyone's medical condition in my entry, and the entry isn\'t about my contributions to the Weekly v. Geov\'s. A column Geov wrote in Eat the State a couple weeks ago in which he accused me of being a \"back channel conduit to the new owners,\" or something like that, proves my point: that he has a tendency to forego actual reporting and print a stream of speculatory gossip. Had he taken the time to call me before he went off on his rants, he would have realized that, upon arriving in Seattle, I went out of my way to have as little contact with VVM brass as possible. Geov's insinuation has been that I'm some sort of insubordinate ratfink, which is absolute horsecrap and incredibly offensive. Geov was as plugged in as a freelancer can be, granted, but the notion that he has a grasp on the day-to-day goings on at the paper is a bit far-fetched.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 7:24AM
Steph says:
\"Geov\'s insinuation has been that I\'m some sort of insubordinate ratfink, which is absolute horsecrap and incredibly offensive.\"
Instead of this junior high sounding- no-one-reading-cares-bullshit-retort...I want to know why anyone thought a fake cover story would move this paper forward?
What was the point of your extremely long entry in the first place if it wasn\'t about the Geov Factor?
Get real and apologize to the readers for sucker-punching them with bad Satire posing as News.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 8:44AM
Mark Fefer says:
Sorry some of you didn\'t enjoy Mike\'s piece last week. I thought it was hilarious and plenty of other readers we heard from did too. One thing I know for certain is we won\'t be pleasing everyone.
I\'m sorry too that Geov doesn\'t like the content of the paper. But I would ask that he, and the rest of you, give us a little time to build back from the loss of valuable contributors like him. It won\'t happen overnight.
Geov is absolutely entitled to his opinion, but for Jamieson to be publishing his comments as if he has some kind of \'inside dope\' on what\'s happening at the paper is ridiculous. And for Jamieson to do so without even bothering to call us only confirms that his views on journalism, and what practices should or shouldn\'t be followed, aren\'t anything we need to pay attention to.
Yes, writers come (we just hired one this week) and writers depart, sometimes with strong, legitimate objections to what the paper is doing. Not quite sure how that qualifies as \'feces in the process of hitting the fan.\' Most of us are having a great time. I\'m guessing roughly the same could be said for the staff of the P-I and Eat the State.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 10:03AM
Ray says:
thump. thump. Chumbawamba needs to do some steph-thumping.
quit your whining - the Weekly is 100 times better than it was a year ago. For the first time there are actually INTERESTING stories. If you can\'t take a joke (and are probably pissed because you fell for the Nickel\'s story), then don\'t read the Weekly. Get off your Seattle-ier than thou soap box, put on your head so we don\'t have to hear your whiney ass.
Geov was a waste of space...he was no Romeo in black jeans.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 10:24AM
mugsy bogues says:
ever heard of satire, steph, you hog, or was \"borat\" lost on you, too?
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 10:27AM
HSS says:
Now I see that your weekly e-newsletter has been replaced by one mere link to seattleweekly.com. God. What\'s next? Will you forego four-color printing for a full black-and-white paper
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 10:38AM
Luther says:
HSS: Check your email application settings. You\'re now getting a newsletter which accomodates more people with both a text version and an HTML version. We installed a new newsletter system and this is its first week. With the new system the Text version was forgotten a bit and I apologize about that. The text version will have the same informaton as the HTML version next week.
For now, if you use a more comprehensive email application you can probably toggle your view between Text and HTML.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 11:38AM
just another lurker says:
Geez.
Let\'s see. Fake stories masquerading as real news. Regular columns of made-up fluff instead of substance (The Uptight Seattlite, Ask a Mexican) when there are many, many real issues out there to be covered. Filler that consists of really important content like \"Hey, this guy looks like Billy Joel!\" Mike, why should we take anything The Weekly prints as serious anymore?
You lose Parrish-- well, whatever. You lose Philip Dawdy. Let me second or third the opinion: I came here regularly to read his articles. Real investigative journalism. When is Rick Anderson going to bail out?
It\'s really sad to see The Weekly crash and burn like this.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 12:37PM
ellis conklin says:
Contrary to popular belief, Mike Seely is not Michael Lacy\'s pet rat. That distinction belongs to none other than Charles Bearkowski, an ambitious and highly-driven writer at St. Louis\' Riverfront Times.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 12:40PM
jack clark says:
I for one love fake stories masquerading as a real news. While playing with the Giants in the 1970s, one of my managers, Jimmy Davenport, enjoyed posting fake lineups before the game. He was a real kidder, all right. One game, I remember, instead of having me down to bat third like I almost always did, he wrote on the lineup card, Seymour Butts. God, that was funny. In another game, he replaced me with I.P. Daily. Boy, those were the days. It\'s because of old Jimmy D. that I\'ve learned to appreciate a well-writen fake story that any good alternative weekly must occasionally serve up to its readers. As Davenport, himself an aficinado of good old-fashioned parody, used to tell us players: \"Hey guys, I don\'t sit down with no newspaper to read about the roots of poverty.\" I\'ll never forget that.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 1:02PM
Reporterward says:
Easy solution here. Hire me.
The Weekly gains some much needed and instant street cred with my native roots and knowledge of local history and customs. I pen articles that send the local political hierarchy scrambling. My cheeky, puckish and upbeat writing style gains advertisers and readers. And Don doesn\'t have to shelter from the elements using free Strangers as fire fuel.
Winners all around.
Besides, I think I\'ve been the only journalist in this state to defend you guys:-)
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 4:26PM
smoke says:
mmmm, must kill messenger... mmmm, must lash out at critics...
mmmm, must make up news in futile attempt to be relevant...
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 4:36PM
Steph says:
Hey Seely we got the people posting on the blog!
That Linda Evans part was the dead give away.
Getting the big boss to respond on the blog: priceless.
Cheers!
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 4:44PM
Seely says:
Thanks, Steffi. Ward: e-mail me, brutha.
Posted On: Wednesday, Nov. 8 2006 @ 5:22PM
BobH says:
Your petty, mean-spirited posts here tell me all I need to know about the people now running the Weekly and the direction it is headed.
Posted On: Thursday, Nov. 9 2006 @ 9:51AM
green j-beans says:
The Weekly is a much more fun and spiffy weekly than it was a year ago. The new columns add humor into an uptight place. Change is hard, get over yourselves.
Posted On: Thursday, Nov. 9 2006 @ 1:54PM