fandomhigh | Journalism Class - Thursday October 20

Journalism Class - Thursday October 20

Spider is staring suspiciously at a bowl of cold cereal which is resting on the center of his desk. Beside it sits a box with a goofy looking cartoon character with a large, blue hat. Waiting until his students are mostly settled, he finally looks up to address them.

"We've dealt with a number of shifts in personality, disguises, extreme body modification and outright impersonations since the beginning of the term. A surprisingly small number of people have questioned any of these things or even caught on to them in a timely fashion and I'm becoming somewhat disappointed in the way that you, aspiring journalists, have ceased to question some of these issues. Professor Williams is a very good case in point. Mugged, impersonated...." Spider shook his head sadly. "You're supposed to be journalists, people whose job it is to get to the heart and truth of the matter, not only to expose the truth... but to discover the lies."

He prodded cautiously at the bowl, which continued to do nothing. "Exposing the hidden truth is the very heart of journalism. Reading the subtext, hearing the things which aren't said, learning to pick and choose the things that are true from an interview or investigation are what I'm supposed to be teaching you. I want every student today to make three statements. Two of them should be true, one of them should be false - all should be plausible. I want each student to examine the statements made by the others and decide which is the false statement."

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Before class begins, D'anna stops by the coffee machine in the back for a refill. She sips at the hot liquid while Spider speaks, wondering where he's going with all this. When he gets to the end, she groans quietly to herself and hides her face in the hand that isn't holding her coffee. Between this and Interpersonal Communication (http://www.livejournal.com/community/fandomhigh/247128.html), she chose the right shirt (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v722/no_chocolate/FH/taft.jpg) this morning.

"Two truths and a lie? I can handle that." She narrowed her eyes and took another drink while she thought. Then she leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms. "Alright. Everyone has the right to vote, all living humans breath air, and the sun is always out."

Beka studies D'Anna from where she leans in the doorframe and gives a tight nod.

"Definitions. Everyone doesn't have a right to vote, if everyone includes all sentients and sentients include machines or marine mammals or probably vampires. Also depends on where.

"All living humans breathe air. I think that's true. If you said 'beings', that would be a lie. Well, maybe. Vampires aren't living.

"And, the sun is always out...depends on what you mean by 'out'. It's always there. It may not be shining through the clouds. But if you live in space, like I do...did...it's always out."

Angela nods. "What Beka said. Plus, even on earth, you have to look at time zones. The sun is always out *somewhere,* even if it's the middle of the night here in Fandom."

D'anna smiled and nodded, "yeah, exactly."

"Good point." Beka smiled at Angela. "Hey. Haven't seen you in a while. How's everything?"

Angela attempts a weak smile. "If I tell you that'll give away the answer. But, um ... my classes are okay, and physically, I'm fine."

"Tell you what. Between you and me? I can always tell when #3 is true with you." She gives Angela a sympathetic look. "Your smiles don't reach your eyes.

"If you want to talk, I'm listening. But before you do, if it has anything to do with Angelus, you should know that he and I are getting along well right now." Beka's tone is warm, friendly, and in no way threatening. She's following through on a promise of honesty.

Angela bites her lip, thinking about it. She lowers her voice so only Beka can hear. "Nothing directly to do with Angelus," she says, reasoning that's close enough to the truth. "Just ... Marty and I had a fight, and we broke up Tuesday night."

Beka puts herself between Angela and D'Anna, to help screen the conversation. "I don't really know what to say. I'm sorry seems ridiculous. Is it permanent?" Warm, genuine sympathy floods her voice, despite her inability to come up with inappropriate words.

Angela smiles a little, touched by Beka's sympathy. "I don't know. I think so, but people keep telling me it will blow over." She bites on a thumbnail. "We're both going on the Plotting Zoo trip this weekend, so maybe we can talk then. If he even wants to talk to me, which I wouldn't blame him if he didn't. I said some pretty rotten things."

"Hey. He's the one who talks about redemption. He ought to understand forgiveness. It sounds like you're sorry. So... hopefully it will work out."

Angela shrugs. "Maybe. I'm not even sure I would want to get back with him, you know? I mean, just the way he looked at me during our fight..." she looks grim. "It was the first time I could see why he was good at what he used to do."

Beka studies her. "I'm not sure I think you mean that. Your feelings are really strong for him, good and bad." With a wry, self-effacing smile, she continues, "You've seen past me looking like I'd be good at what he used to do."

Angela shrugs, looking down at her desk. "Strong feelings aren't a reason to stay with someone if it doesn't work, are they? And ... yeah, you could do what he used to do. But it's different to see that in a boyfriend than in a friend. That might not totally make sense, but whatever, it's true," she says softly.

She looks up at Beka with a half-smile. "But thank you for believing in us. Even if we don't work it out, and I'm not sure we will ... it means something that you wanted us to."

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valentine-tart.livejournal.com - 2005-10-21 00:33 (UTC) - Expand

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chasingangela - 2005-10-21 00:40 (UTC) - Expand

D'anna nodded her acquiescence to Beka. "The right to vote is held scared by those ruled by various forms of democracy, but that right is usually governed by various restriction such as, but not limited to, age, class, location, and sex; as far as I know, all living humans do breath air; and stars cannot be physically contained, therefore they are always 'out'." She took another drink of her coffee before turning to Angela...

Beka sipped her coffee, then smiled. "I hadn't even thought of ages, classes, gender. But of course, that's even clearer than my examples."

"No worries," D'anna grinned over her coffee cup. "We all work from what we know."

The grin surprised her. D'Anna didn't usually. Beka smiled back. "Where I'm from, no one votes. So, it was a wild extrapolation on my part."

One's the lie. At least where I come from. If you're a convicted felon you aren't allowed to vote. And if you're under 18 you can't either.

D'anna grinned at Jack, "Yep. Voting works similarly back home, so I figured it was worth a shot. How's your article going?"

"Good. Great. Peachy-keen in fact."

...

"I'm starting it tomorrow."

D'anna laughed, "Not one of those early bird types, eh?"

"I work better under pressure."

"Good luck with that, I hear Chloe and Jake can be quiet tenacious." D'anna winked.

"Yeah. They're... something all right. They seem to thrive on stress and caffeine alone."

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