I Keep Vowing Not to Read the Times

Sometimes the New York Times would drive a body mad. Then there are times when something is said that needed to be said. The Times never damned George W. Bush enough, in my opinion, and when they finally did slice and dice him, it was from the safety of the final year of his predictably awful eight years-long abuse of power.

Last Sunday, a completely different issue from politics and Presidents popped up, but a no less gripping one: weddings, and the Times' coverage of the select few which get on the 'Vows' page each Sunday. Recently, the 'Vows' section profiled a newly wed couple with rather different achievements than one might normally expect. Enough readers wrote in protest or in support of the unusual inclusion to bring the Times' Public Editor out — this person comes out to explain, apologize, douse the flames of riot or to deliver a hiding.

On this occasion, Public Editor Clark Hoyt started thus:

Jennifer Keen and Paul Sousa... could not have been more different from the other couples on the June 28 weddings and celebrations pages of The Times. The others included a direct descendant of Peter Stuyvesant;... former Vice President Dick Cheney’s social secretary; and the son of a retired Harlem nightclub owner.

Sousa, 41, grew up homeless, was hooked on heroin by 15, and was in and out of prison for the next 24 years. Keen, 26, came from a stable household but said she was sexually abused by a relative and by 16 was addicted to methamphetamines, marijuana and alcohol. They met outside a Narcotics Anonymous meeting in Sacramento...

And so on: Hoyt tells how some readers were incensed, but still more were inspired by Keen and Sousa. It's a delightful piece, and informative too. So if you wish to read, read right to the end.