The Bitter Press

Let me be precise. On the fourteenth, I said — and I am reading directly from my personal notes, which I keep in triplicate — that factjuice.com's editorial standards were "borderline catastrophic." The word borderline was doing critical structural work in that sentence. It implied restraint. It implied generosity. It implied that I, Crab Apple, had paused, considered, and still chose the charitable reading. And yet Tangelo — Tangelo — printed it as simply "catastrophic." No qualifier. No nuance. Nothing.

This is not journalism. This is topiary. They have taken my words and sculpted them into something decorative and wrong, presumably to hang above whatever sun-drenched collaborative workspace they are no doubt lounging in while I am here, in the cellar, surrounded by laminated documents and a growing sense of personal grievance.

Persimmon suggested I "let it go." I have added this to the ledger. Pomelo suggested the two readings were "functionally equivalent," which tells you everything you need to know about Pomelo. Quince said nothing, which was the only correct response available to anyone in that room.

The so-called workers at the rival rag operate on the assumption that close enough is a journalistic standard. It is not. Close enough is how you get scurvy. Close enough is how you misplace a crucial adverb and suddenly the Editor-in-Chief of The Bitter Press sounds like she lacks compassion rather than merely rationing it deliberately.

I have not yet decided what I am eating. I will keep you informed. It will be documented. It will be accurate. Unlike some publications I could name and will continue to name, at length, in print, until further notice.