How to Write a Dire Headline

I really don’t mean to make light of the Coronavirus...

Is it Coronavirus?

Or is it? Wuhan Virus

Or is it? Chinese Flu

Or is it? Novel Coronavirus

Or is it? COVID-19

Or is it? CCP (Chinese Communist Party) Virus

Or is it? SARS-CoV-2 Virus

Or is it? Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2

Or is it? Coronavirus Disease 2019

Or is it? That Dire Pandemic That’s Going To Kill Us All!

I am not going to volunteer to become Number Next to get infected but can I be allowed to say that it ain’t as bad as we are being told it is bad?

I can just see your collective eyes popping out of your collective heads. Put your eyes back in and allow me to explain.

************

There is a lot of effort going into making this Virus sound worse than it actually is. Your eyes are popping again. Calm down and I will try and convince you that I am not being silly.

Here is a Dire News Headline...

“60% Of French Sailors on Aircraft Carrier Were Infected With COVID-19!”

This Dire Headline conjures up Dire Images and Dire Thoughts like...

Ø Golly gee! That’s awful!

Ø Those poor souls!

Ø They can’t get away from it!

Ø They are trapped on that ship!

Ø It’s going to get all of them!

Ø Heads are going to roll for allowing this to happen!
>This last bullet is a Growing Constant in the Good Ole USofA today. No matter what happens, it has to be someone’s fault...Lack of rain, Dramatic ends to football games, Hurricanes, Taking too long to develop a vaccine, Too much rain, Etcetera, Etcetera, Etcetera.

Click Here: https://youtu.be/iSd6-EvBgN4

The late Paul Harvey just dropped in for a visit. He took one look over my shoulder at what I was pecking out and said, “Fella, tell them the Rest of the Story”.

I always do what Paul tells me. The Rest of the Story is not as Dire as they (whoever they are) want us to think it’s Dire...

Ø Of the 1,074 sailors on board only 2 required Intensive Care.

Ø Not a single sailor died of the virus.

************

Can’t you just hear the Dire Headline Focus Group at the Newspaper talking in their Dire Headline Production Meeting...

Ø How about we lead with the fact that there are 1,074 sailors on board that ship.

Ø That’s a good start but let’s see if we can make it sound worse.

Ø How about there are 2 sailors in Intensive Care?

Ø What’s wrong with you? That’s not dire at all!

Ø How about no one died?

Ø Get out of here! That’s less dire than only 2 in Intensive Care!

Ø I got it! There are 1,074 sailors on board the ship and 60% of them have contracted the Dire Coronavirus implying that they are all going to die.

Ø That’s it!

Ø That ought to depress the heck out of them!

Let’s go to Happy Hour!

Would I kid u?

Smartfella

Lagniappe: A Fella Wow Fact... Yul Brynner played the role of the king in The King and I 4,625 times. Wow!

This is the next statue to be torn down because Yul Brynner played a King 4,625 times and he was not a real King... 

(Statue of Brynner in front of his birthplace in Vladivostok)