Honolulu Lite
BACK in the old days of newspapers, when type was cast from hot lead and all sports editors were named "Red," there were hacks and there were flacks. Flacks get paid
for taking flakHacks were newspaper writers, generally rumpled old guys who got paid by the line. Flacks were press agents, who got paid for either getting their clients' names in the papers, or, more importantly, keeping their clients' names out.
Neither term was considered derogatory, considering that the professions themselves were below dog catcher on the public glamour meter.
Somewhere along the line newspaper writers became "journalists" and press agents turned into "public relations specialists." I suspect both professions today still would come in lower than an "animal control officer" in a glamour poll.
Hacks and flacks have always had a symbiotic relationship, two organisms feeding on each other for mutual advantage. Like all creatures forced to exist so intimately together, the relationship becomes a love/hate affair with the prevailing attitude being, "What have you done for me lately?"
Now comes Doug Carlson, a Hawaii public relations professional and flack for former Bishop Estate trustee Lokelani Lindsey. In a recent column, I questioned the way the trustees, who had an entire public relations department at their beck and call, could end up with single-digit approval ratings in a recent poll. I pointed out that Lindsey, in fact, had hired her own personal flack, whom I didn't name.
CONSIDERING Lindsey had an unfavorable rating of 84 percent, higher, according to the people who conducted the poll, than even racist David Duke, I figured I was doing Carlson a favor by keeping his name out of it. My point was that you could probably get an unfavorable rating that high on your own, WITHOUT the help of a flack.
Sometimes you just can't win.
Carlson wrote a letter to the editor blaming Lindsey's poor poll showings on negative coverage by the newspaper. You have to wonder if she had gotten a FAVORABLE rating of 84 percent, would he also be so generously crediting the newspaper. My hunch is probably not.
Linsdey was getting in the paper so much because she was doing unusual things in her position as trustee, like threatening students, trying to get a popular principal fired and getting paid more than the president of the United States. It was not so much negative reporting as it was reporting of negative behavior. When your fellow trustees go to court to get you kicked out of your job, your problem isn't the newspapers, it's you.
But anyway, Carlson is welcome to his opinion on the matter. Where he really hurt my feelings (hacks have feelings, too), was when he accused me of using the term "flack" unfairly to describe public relations people.
"Newspaper columnists apparently can get away with using derogatory terms to describe a whole class of people. Elsewhere in society, such behavior is unacceptable," he wrote.
I understand Carlson may be feeling a bit peevish. The Linsdey campaign obviously wasn't a huge success. But the use of the term "flack" is not derogatory. It is slang, sure. But the dictionary says "flack" simply means "press agent."
So Doug, you certainly are a flack, and, judging from your reputation, a good one. While you may hate the hacks in this town right now, I have a sneaking suspicion you'll get over it.
Charles Memminger, winner of
National Society of Newspaper Columnists
awards in 1994 and 1992, writes "Honolulu Lite"
Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Write to him at the Honolulu Star-Bulletin,
P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu, 96802
or send E-mail to charley@nomayo.com or
71224.113@compuserve.com.
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