THE MENTORING THING

American journalism is full of stories of cantankerous yet competent and fair mentors. Almost every journalist who has reached the heights has a story about an editor he encountered at the dawn of his career, someone who was sage and patient and pushed the fledgling scribe to reach beyond mere adequacy and grasp greatness. "As I stand here at the summit of my profession," our grown-up journalist might one day say, "without having committed acts of plagiarism to numerous to mention or inventing sources, I look back fondly at the counsel of my first editor, Vern Hardass, who told me, 'Patterson, you can get chicks without plagiarizing or making up sources.'"

Such acknowledgment is touching. So I guess it's a real suck for me that most of the young journalists that I have coached would probably say, "That rat-bastard nearly ruined me."

And deliberately, too, I might add. It's not that I hated them. Some of these novice copy editors have been so nice that it was with great reluctance that I set about dismantling their futures. But when they walk into a newsroom radiating a First Amendment purity and fervor, they are not saying, "Here I stand, rejecting the materialism of the surrounding consumer culture in order to make a positive difference in the world." They are saying, "Here I stand, rejecting the materialism of the surrounding consumer culture in order to keep your salary just a little north of poverty, John Parnell." So faced with such a threat, what else could I do but adopt the worldview of the Corleones: "It's not personal, it's just business."

Most young copy editors are eager to get along, eager to work and, best of all, eager to trust. They listen attentively to the grizzled veterans of the desk, trying to soak up our wisdom and flatter us with their rapt attention. This does not mean they are entirely gullible (I've never once persuaded one to spend an entire winter night sitting on the banks of the Ocmulgee River and trying to get a photo of "Mully" the legendary Ocmulgee sea monster), but it does mean they might be a little careless about letting people look over their shoulder while they are typing in their passwords.

Getting ahold of a password is where the real fun starts. In our system, our work is traced through our sign-ons. Any change I make in a story is duly noted to have been the handiwork of "JPARNELL." So you can see what a blast I can have if I am able to sign on under "SNEWBIE." I could go into a story and change this sentence:

The district attorney said Wednesday that he would review the case when he returns from an out-of-town trip.

To this sentence:

The district attorney said Wednesday that he would review the case when he returns from an acid trip.

And nobody would be able to trace it back to me. The blame would go to our eager yet careless novice, as would the reprimand.

Unfortunately, that can only work a few times before too many questions get asked. The tech guys would start rummaging through computers and heaven only knows what sort of smoking kilobytes they might find. So that means it's sometimes best to do 'em in with style.

In this instance, "style" does not mean that I would don an Armani suit to do my dark work. Rather, "style" is how a newspaper governs the unruly minutiae of the English language: hypens, commas, questions about capitalization, questions about numerals, questions about acronyms. It often eludes logic, and so spares us lengthy explanations. Whenever a rookie toddles up to a news desk veteran with a question about hyphenating, we usually just pat the rookie on the head, smile affectionately and say, "That's just our style."

Rookies hear that enough and they soon move into the "acceptance" stage of their employment. They start doing whatever they are told, no matter how cockeyed or silly it might seem. For instance, I like to tell new hires that it's our style to put words of interest in bold italics, like this: "The congressman admitted he had an inappropriate sexual relationship with the young intern." Better yet, throw in a leering (!) and you've a whole new way of reaching out to the readers. "The high school principal said the teacher had had numerous sexual encounters with the cheerleaders (!), but declined to say more."

If they fall for that, then it's just a short push to get them to start putting emoticons into copy. Either of the above sentences could have used a ;) or a :-o.

Needless to say, the poo-bahs at the paper would frown upon such "style." They would ruthlessly hunt down its perpetrators, and I would happily point my finger at our by now thoroughly confused and demoralized novice. I would deflect accusations against me as the hysterics of someone undone by the strain of daily deadlines. And I would chuckle warmly as the novice is led off to the executive editor's office.

Is any of that going to endear me to rising journalists? Of course not. But it's such fun. Look, almost every profession eats its young somehow, and I have a big appetite.

We have an opening on our news right now. Care to apply?