Bushes. Local weather. Dams. Parks. Fish. Airports. Elections. Extra fish.
These are the subjects weighing most closely on readers’ minds, in line with the submissions which have been flowing into the oped@seattletimes.com e mail inbox. The checklist reads like a kind of “say you’re from Washington with out saying you’re from Washington” memes.
Don’t get me flawed — if writers are sizzling about these subjects, that doubtless means plenty of readers are, too. An outdated journalism adage advises that each one who writes a letter represents round 30 individuals who really feel the identical means. That metric is a long time outdated and pre-personal pc, so every letter or opinion submitted in 2023 doubtless represents hundreds of individuals.
Because the chief wrangler of op-eds, or visitor essays, in The Seattle Instances, I welcome all these bushes, dams, parks and fish. As 2024 looms, I encourage extra of you to share your (nicely thought-out) opinions, sizzling takes and distinctive factors of view on not simply these subjects, however any others that contribute to a strong, wholesome and, importantly, civil debate concerning the problems with our time, giant and small.
A part of The Seattle Instances’ dedication to a free press is curating and publishing a broad vary of concepts and opinions, from a broad vary of individuals. What if it contradicts our editorial board’s acknowledged place? Doesn’t matter. That has no bearing on what we select to print. Neither does your age, training stage, faith, ethnicity or whether or not you hail from a metropolis or a farm. I wish to hear from you, and your fellow readers do, too. The extra views we provide each other, the extra we study. The extra concepts we soak up, the extra curious, and empathetic, we turn out to be. It’s good how that works.
So what does make a bit extra prone to be chosen for publication?
It will get to the best mailbox. Kind your op-eds and My Takes within the physique of the e-mail and ship it to: oped@seattletimes.com. Don’t ship Phrase attachments or PDFs. It’s an old style methodology, however Phrase docs are simply misplaced by Outlook and PDFs don’t play properly with our content material administration system. You solely stay as soon as, and I don’t wish to spend time on this earthly airplane wrestling a PDF to the metaphorical mat.
It sticks to our phrase size. Op-Eds, which run Mondays-Fridays, and My Takes, which run on Saturdays, must be 650 phrases, max. Our weekday editorial web page is strictly that, one web page. It’s residence to an editorial, a syndicated column and an op-ed, or visitor essay, and at the very least one letter. (Shameless plug: Many regional newspapers now not curate a full slate of editorial content material. And a whole lot of U.S. counties don’t have newspapers in any respect, depriving readers of the prospect to study their neighbors and share their very own factors of view.) I’ve acquired items with a very good kernel buried in an eye-glazing 3,000 phrases; that’s not possible to trim in a coherent style, even for me, with my almost three a long time of machete-wielding enhancing expertise.
It has a robust level, clearly made. An op-ed, or visitor essay, stands out from information tales since you, the author, take a stand. What’s the problem? What’s at stake? What must be accomplished to repair it? Inform readers — and me — why all of us ought to care. Preserve it centered, acknowledge detractors and preserve it credible with hyperlinks to established sources. I’ve room for eight op-eds per week. The bar is excessive. Inform individuals one thing they might not know. Make your op-ed succinct and make it sing.
It’s of native/regional curiosity by an area/regional author. We give precedence to Northwest writers who deal with points distinctive to our area. In fact, some subjects are common — human rights, well being care, the fentanyl disaster — and we think about these, too. Nonetheless, our readers can get opinions about large nationwide and world points numerous locations. There aren’t many locations they will learn an opinion from somebody in Naches, Sumas or Royal Metropolis.
It’s solely ours. We don’t publish op-eds which have appeared elsewhere, and that features on a web site, social media platform or weblog. That’s unfair to the parents who observe our pointers and provides The Seattle Instances the best of first refusal; just like the pythons in Florida, these crowd out native species.
It’s civil in tone. No name-calling or derogatory language towards others allowed. Don’t name individuals moonbats, wing nuts, soy-drinking vegans or MAGA idiots. Don’t accuse one other individual or group of one thing. Don’t begin out with “I guess you received’t print this.” If you’re decided to get off on the flawed foot, you’re proper. I received’t.
Issues that an op-ed is just not:
A petition or open letter: We restrict bylines to not more than three. Letters belong within the Northwest Voices part, whose pointers are right here: seattletimes.com/opinion.
An admiration of an issue: That’s a submission that does some hand-wringing however not a lot else. We all know local weather change is unhealthy, AI and TikTok might not be good for us, orcas are endangered and housing is unbelievably costly. Now what?
An commercial: Please disclose in your writer bio when you have a monetary tie to the topic. That doesn’t mechanically bench you; typically, for instance, if a legislation impacts solely enterprise individuals, it is smart for somebody in that line of labor to submit an opinion. We’ll give it a better going-over, nonetheless, to make sure it’s a well timed subject and isn’t simply mistaken for a approach to drum up enterprise. In different phrases, does the subject and experience outweigh the monetary tie?
An article that can not be trimmed or altered in any means; in different phrases, each phrase is a pearl: If I make substantial adjustments to your op-ed, I’ll ship you a draft for evaluation for accuracy. Chances are you’ll disagree with the adjustments, and we will talk about; you’re free to withdraw your op-ed and go residence should you discover adjustments too egregious. Additionally, please don’t resubmit new drafts after I’ve despatched you affirmation of my intent to publish. If in case you have a heart-stopping second about one thing that have to be modified as a result of it’s inaccurate, let me know; in any other case, a number of submissions merely gum up the works and vastly improve the prospect of an incomplete model being revealed.
An entire set of pointers is at seattletimes.com/opinion.
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