Politico magazine’s Jack Shafer wrote an article Tuesday announcing "New York Times Journalists Are Groveling to Their Readers. That's Pathetic." Shafer described his horror at getting a piece of mail from the Times, and the writer was columnist Nicholas Kristof, pandering to the incredible smarts of anyone who would decide to subscribe to the old Gray Lady:
Printed on his Times stationery and addressed to “Dear Times subscriber,” the note began with a lie: “Look, I’m not a marketer,” Kristof wrote, as he marketed the devil out of me for 350 words, thanking me for subscribing to the Times so that he and his colleagues can cover the world. “We have your back, because you have ours,” he wrote, his pandering reaching a crescendo, and closing with his wish that I would continue to shell out 1,000 bucks a year for the privilege of reading him and his colleagues in print.
Two things bugged me about the letter. First was Kristof’s presumption that I might be a willing vessel for his gratitude. My relationship with him is more like my relationship to the station manager of the subway—he’s just another interchangeable employee producing a service that I use. I need or want a letter of thanks from Kristof as much as I do one from the station manager for riding the train. The truth of the matter is that I don’t subscribe to the Times so that he can, in his words, shine “a light on important or neglected stories.” I tolerate his heavy moral preening and self-indulgence so that I can read the rest of the Times package. His gratitude is the last thing I want from the paper.
Then, he reported, he turned to page C-6 in Tuesday's paper, where he found a full-page ad announcing "A heartfelt thank you to our subscribers." Below that were 19 gushy quotes from Times journalists about how their subscribers are just the best readers ever:
“The people who read the Times are without question the smartest and most insightful readers out there, and having you directly involved in our journlaism we do makes us a better organization.” – Tim Herrera, Smarter Living editor
“Day in and day out, the Times’ readers and journalists lend one another ideas, and passion, and even hope.” – Ken Paul, senior staff editor, New York section
“The readers of the Times are the best thing about the Times.” – Binyamin Applebaum, national correspondent
Shafer compared all this to “the happy-faces that bosses make waiters, airline attendants, hotel desk clerks and other public-facing employees wear. You accept such unctuosity from your doorman or garbage collector or newspaper delivery guy because 1) you know it’s not sincere and 2) you know they’re fishing for a Christmas tip.”
Shafer flags all this as "cringeworthy" and insincere, insisting he knows how journalists really feel about their audience:
These corporate blandishments sound wrong coming from journalists because we’ve been trained to regard them as cynical, independent, defiant-of-authority cusses—which they are. The idea that a journalist—especially a Times journalist—might be grateful to his readers doesn’t pass the stink test because almost to a one, journalists feel entitled. They think they’ve got a right to their jobs and that if the river of gratitude must run, it should flow from their readers to them, not the other way around.
To me, the quote that stands out is from Cliff Levy, deputy managing editor, as he suggests liberal Times reporters and liberal Times readers are mutually amplifying forces of positive social change: "Our subscribers are among our greatest strengths. Your voices amplify what the Times stands for: the power of information, ideas, and debate to shape the world and inspire change."
