Dr. Ink,
I’ve worked at three small-medium daily newspapers (top circ.: 35,000), and at all three, the assistant managing editor has been universally acknowledged as a nincompoop. They had no respect from either reporters or copy editors; were “known” for their visual presentation abilities, but their design work was panned all around; and couldn’t write to save their lives. Two began their careers as copy editors and one as a cartoonist/illustrator.
Are all AMEs like this? Does the management person you’d expect to be closest to the staff always inspire derision? Is the job a black hole where idiots go to inflict their misguided passions on others?
Signed,
A Questioning Copy Editor
Answer:
The American Heritage Dictionary defines nincompoop as “a fool, simpleton, blockhead, dolt,” but insists that the origin is “unknown.” Dr. Ink would guess it has something to do with that last syllable.
This provocative hypothesis, that AMEs suffer as a class from nincompoopery, has never occurred to Doc before. But what if we accepted, for the sake of argument, that it was true. What could account for this condition?
- Perhaps upper management tries to hide problematic employees in the middle of the pack.
- Perhaps newspapers are unwilling to pay good reporters or designers enough to continue to grow in their craft. So, for money and status, they seek promotion to manager, but lack the talent to do the job well.
- Perhaps the word “Assistant” can be traced back to Indo-European roots for “lacking power, talent, and respect.”
- Perhaps we fail to train new leaders adequately so that it is inevitable that they slouch toward nincompoopery.
- Perhaps the reporters and copy editors who work for nincompoops are, as a group, jerks.
The American Heritage Dictionary defines jerk as “a dull, stupid, or fatuous person; numbskull.” The origin, alas, is “obscure.”
But it is fun to think of the worst American newsrooms as comprising a bunch of jerks working for an elite corps of nincompoops.
