Steve Salerno: Twitter Jail and Where Media Went Wrong
KEY MOMENTS
0:00 – Intro: Steve Salerno, author of SHAM
2:41 – Twitter jail over "go jump in a volcano"
5:28 – Teaching writing with just a BA
7:07 – Why writers get paid so much less today
9:32 – Literary magazines and submission purgatory
11:48 – Writing for Playboy and Esquire
13:38 – Joan Didion, media ethics, and NewsNation
15:36 – Context buried in police shooting stories
18:39 – Can the news return to straight journalism?
20:08 – Marianne Williamson, Tony Robbins, and self-help gurus
22:04 – The self-esteem movement and narcissism
24:37 – The school mirror that said "the most special person"
25:41 – Raising kids without false praise
29:16 – Rewrites, notes, and Lou's sketch comedy
31:51 – "Please convert to non-shit": a Wall Street Journal edit
33:46 – Interviewing NYU students about masking kids
36:15 – Banned words on campus and teaching at UNLV
40:42 – Tom Wolfe's The Painted Word and Andrew Wyeth
42:51 – George Floyd and media context
45:04 – What Killed Michael Brown? and Ta-Nehisi Coates
49:17 – A father who had to hide being Italian
50:07 – Putting fear in perspective
51:57 – Over-40 baseball and the batting cages
55:48 – Giving up jazz, and wrap-up
ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Steve Salerno, author of SHAM, joins Lou to talk about Twitter jail, his career in journalism, self-help gurus and the self-esteem movement, and where the media went wrong.
We also get into getting locked out for telling someone to "go jump in a volcano," why writers get paid so much less today, writing for Playboy and Esquire, Joan Didion and media ethics, the context buried in police shooting stories, Marianne Williamson and Tony Robbins, the school mirror that said "the most special person," raising kids without false praise, a Wall Street Journal note that read "please convert to non-shit," Tom Wolfe's The Painted Word, over-40 baseball, and giving up jazz.