What can't be printed?

By Media Farm

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You remember the Gloucester pregnancy pact? The hearsay story from Time Magazine that caused reporters to spew a particularly foul batch of the gossipy shitstorm we call a news cycle? Well it's back, and it actually made the Herald blush last week in its coverage of the Beverly Farm's Horribles parade. While the Herald didn't hold back as much as other local papers, it still saved our fragile brains from knowing the entirety of what happened, while assuring us we were missing "lewd, rude, rolling raunchiness." Laurel Sweet describes the scene in the Herald article, but she conspicuously censors herself:

... the July 4th pregnancy-pocked parade marched on with men in diapers crawling from between a woman's legs propped in birthing stirrups and a giant phallus sprayed the crowd as parents and their tots were confronted with signs like, "GHS Girls Went to Band Camps, Came Back Pregnant Tramps."

And that's just what can be printed.

That's just what can be printed?!! Clearly, the real story here is that the Herald grew some scruples.

Or not. The same issue featured an article from Jessica Van Sack (the new Michelle McPhee), which boasted a super-sensitive headline ("Undercover 'john' takes on trannies, pimps") and this lede: "James Fong has been trapped inside houses of ill repute by giant naked trannies. He's been groped by man-hungry madams."

The story follows Fong, an expert vice detective who's so good at undercover arrests, "the feds have even been known to call and ask him to help them finish the job." (Seriously, the Herald needs to start editing for Freudian slips.) The article rapidly becomes a bizarre sleazy romance novel, devolving into a blob of scented glitter:

But even Fong has his limits. He reached his at the Commonwealth Avenue apartment of a transsexual working girl named "Leeza."

"Before we do anything, you have to get dressed up," said Leeza, shedding her overcoat to reveal a surgically altered woman-in-the-making underneath. "I want you to wear this."

It was the sight of lady's lingerie—thoughtfully laid out in different sizes and colors by the prostitute—that prompted Fong to do something he'd never before done: turn around and walk out. Silently.

Leeza was the one who got away. But that was all right with Fong.

And that's just what can be printed!

THIS WEEK'S Random-Ass Man on the Street award goes to the Somerville Journal, for slipping this quote from a guy "who works as a jester" into a relatively dry article about potential sites for the MBTA extension: "I will jump up and dance around when I see the Green Line here." If you want to be stopped for comment by a Somerville Journal reporter, wear a silly hat or something that jingles.

IF THE INTERNET is the future of journalism, here's hoping Hiawatha Bray has to start filing every day. The Globe's business columnist did a webicle on people waiting in line to buy the new iPhone last week, and it was pure comedic brilliance. There's something about Bray's weird lilting voice that sounds gently sarcastic ... either that, or he's on lithium.

"It's amazing, there's this line of people waiting for a chance to get their hands on the phone," Bray tells the camera, as if he's never seen idiots before. "Something's wrong with these people. And I think we should find out what it is, don't you?"

The seething Mr. Rogers impersonation continues when he interviews a suit from AT&T. "Here we are, inside the store," Bray sighs. The rep starts to say, "Good to see you again," but Bray cuts him off, to say, in dulcet tones, "We did this last year, of course, when the original iPhone rolled out, now you're back with the new iPhone. Why should we care?" The rep audibly gulps.

This repressed anger doesn't quite come across in Bray's written columns, and this is the first indication we've seen that maybe there is some merit to boston.com, the Globe's only growth sector, and its beacon of hope in the dwindling newspaper market. Of course, Bray didn't really report on. you know, news, which is maybe why the real-deal journalist seems so embittered.

In any case, Media Farm wants to be Hiawatha Bray's new best friend. We want to people-watch with him when he's feeling grumpy. We want to cook him dinner and watch him ever-so-politely spit it out. We want to bang him, so long as he'll criticize us the whole time.

And that's just what can be printed!