By now you’ve probably seen this image.
If you haven’t, yes. You’re seeing things correctly. That’s a sticker ad for a gun shop just above the Charleston Post and Courier’s headline about the gun slaughter of nine innocents. It’s a pretty tone deaf move on behalf of the paper.
Please understand. I get it. Newspapers have a lot of moving parts and sometimes you end up with unfortunate juxtapositions. Just last year a cover story I wrote about First Congo Church hit the streets with a fairly graphic ad sticker for picking up dog waste slapped on top. In spite of my best efforts to depict the congregation in a good light, I felt like I’d spread dog crap all over the sanctuary. I felt terrible but advertising money pays my mortgage, so I apologized to everybody, and moved on.
Often — and for very good reasons— advertising and editorial departments stay out of each other’s business. But this. This is different. Every example of gun violence sells more guns. Big money. Plenty to spread around. And it’s being spread around. At least the Commercial Appeal …
… put their full page gun ad on page 13.
