Advice column or WEB OF LIES?
January 24, 2011 6:24 PM Subscribe
I found (roughly) the same question asked of Miss Manners and Dear Abby. Is this a case of one guy copying the other, or did the robot that churns out all the material for the advice columns get lazy? How do these things work?
I read Miss Manners regularly, and tonight, in a sickness-induced case of boredom, started reading through some Dear Abby archives.
I recognized one of the questions as being very similar to a Miss Manners column I read a few days ago, checked back, and it's clearly the same question. The answers are different, though. (Side-by-side screen shot for posterity.)
I was always under the impression that the questions for these things (well, at least Miss Manners) were mostly legitimate, with some artistic license taken in phrasing and wording. Is that not the case? My theory is that MSN is just making things up to fill space, since they're not the official syndicate, and this question is only listed in the MSN Miss Manners archive. A google search for the common phrases shows a bunch of Dear Abby hits and only a couple for Miss Manners.
Or do all of the advice columns work together, with a pool of questions to choose from? And this time someone got sloppy?
Can someone shed some light on this? (And are there people who police this kind of thing? The possible plagiarism here really bugs me.)
I read Miss Manners regularly, and tonight, in a sickness-induced case of boredom, started reading through some Dear Abby archives.
I recognized one of the questions as being very similar to a Miss Manners column I read a few days ago, checked back, and it's clearly the same question. The answers are different, though. (Side-by-side screen shot for posterity.)
I was always under the impression that the questions for these things (well, at least Miss Manners) were mostly legitimate, with some artistic license taken in phrasing and wording. Is that not the case? My theory is that MSN is just making things up to fill space, since they're not the official syndicate, and this question is only listed in the MSN Miss Manners archive. A google search for the common phrases shows a bunch of Dear Abby hits and only a couple for Miss Manners.
Or do all of the advice columns work together, with a pool of questions to choose from? And this time someone got sloppy?
Can someone shed some light on this? (And are there people who police this kind of thing? The possible plagiarism here really bugs me.)
Best answer: According to Judith Martin's website, she writes an additional column for MSN, as well as the syndicated one. So the fact that the column appears only on MSN doesn't matter. Brainmouse's suggestion is plausible, since it is a remarkable question.
posted by brianogilvie at 6:39 PM on January 24, 2011
posted by brianogilvie at 6:39 PM on January 24, 2011
When I was in college, I was editor of the student paper and we had an advise column. And let me just tell you that College students have some of the most boring problems imaginable. Well, at least the ones willing to air their dirty laundry.
What questions we used were either reworded to be more interesting, made up out of whole cloth, or on a rare occasion, stolen and reworded from other advice columns (such as Dear Abby or the syndicate advice column we didn't use because of the heavy handed Christian message) because our columnist felt she could answer it better for our target audience.
Obviously it's the same question reworded. It's possible that one person sent the question to both of them. The columns do not share a syndicate, so it's unlikely that the question was shared that way.
posted by aristan at 6:42 PM on January 24, 2011
What questions we used were either reworded to be more interesting, made up out of whole cloth, or on a rare occasion, stolen and reworded from other advice columns (such as Dear Abby or the syndicate advice column we didn't use because of the heavy handed Christian message) because our columnist felt she could answer it better for our target audience.
Obviously it's the same question reworded. It's possible that one person sent the question to both of them. The columns do not share a syndicate, so it's unlikely that the question was shared that way.
posted by aristan at 6:42 PM on January 24, 2011
Response by poster: It hadn't even occurred to me that the same person might ask the question twice. I suppose it's possible. Weird that they'd edit them like that, though.
posted by phunniemee at 6:45 PM on January 24, 2011
posted by phunniemee at 6:45 PM on January 24, 2011
I heard an interview with Amy Dickinson a while ago that discussed her inheritance of Ann Landers' job. If I remember correctly, it also discussed the subculture of folks that write in to advice columnists, including their creation of fake and duplicate questions.
posted by zamboni at 6:49 PM on January 24, 2011
posted by zamboni at 6:49 PM on January 24, 2011
Best answer: This happens not infrequently.
Either the old or new Prudie (I think) wrote a short piece on the "same letter" problem once. Basically, she noted that though hundreds of letters come in, few need little editing and are appropriate for publishing. And, as you know since you're one of those people, many people who read advice columns read (and submit to) more than one. Can't fined the piece right now, but I'll have another google in a moment.
posted by lesli212 at 6:50 PM on January 24, 2011
Either the old or new Prudie (I think) wrote a short piece on the "same letter" problem once. Basically, she noted that though hundreds of letters come in, few need little editing and are appropriate for publishing. And, as you know since you're one of those people, many people who read advice columns read (and submit to) more than one. Can't fined the piece right now, but I'll have another google in a moment.
posted by lesli212 at 6:50 PM on January 24, 2011
If I were that asker of advice and, say, submitted my letter to Dear Abby first, I have to admit that I would probably seek advice a second time. Dear Abby's response is essentially DTMFA and, since from the way my question is written I clearly don't want to end the relationship, I would then want to hear something that validated my choice to stay with "Mac" from an equivalent source--so I'd send the letter to Miss Manners.
Just a theory.
posted by equivocator at 7:03 PM on January 24, 2011
Just a theory.
posted by equivocator at 7:03 PM on January 24, 2011
I've seen the same letter run in Dear Abby and Annie's Mailbox (the new continuation of the Ann Landers column) a few times before, and also assumed that the writer was just sending the letter multiple places.
posted by Ashley801 at 7:15 PM on January 24, 2011
posted by Ashley801 at 7:15 PM on January 24, 2011
Yes, they send their letters in to multiple places in hopes that at least one of them will publish it.
posted by Melismata at 7:16 PM on January 24, 2011
posted by Melismata at 7:16 PM on January 24, 2011
As someone who has written a letter to Miss Manners, Dear Abby, and Annie's Mailbox and had it answered in two of the three columns (although not in the same week), I am sure that the asker just sent the same question to all three columns. The editing really varies by site -- my letter was still recognizable as mine in both cases, but people reading them in different weeks on different sites probably would not have correlated them the way you've done here.
(In my case, the answers were the same -- DTMFA -- and if I'd had AskMeFi back then, I wouldn't have needed their advice or their editing.)
posted by peanut_mcgillicuty at 7:36 PM on January 24, 2011 [3 favorites]
(In my case, the answers were the same -- DTMFA -- and if I'd had AskMeFi back then, I wouldn't have needed their advice or their editing.)
posted by peanut_mcgillicuty at 7:36 PM on January 24, 2011 [3 favorites]
Cary Tennis (Salon) and Prudie (Slate) once answered the same letter within days of each other. Both addressed the situation in subsequent columns.
posted by carmicha at 6:30 AM on January 25, 2011
posted by carmicha at 6:30 AM on January 25, 2011
Pretty much all advice column submissions are edited. And many people submit their questions to more than one column.
And most of the questions are incredibly dull and repetitive, so it's not that surprising that the same interesting question would be picked out of both slush piles.
Carolyn Hax occasionally touches on the mechanics of an advice column in her weekly chats at the Washington Post site, and it's fairly interesting.
posted by jacquilynne at 10:12 PM on January 27, 2011
And most of the questions are incredibly dull and repetitive, so it's not that surprising that the same interesting question would be picked out of both slush piles.
Carolyn Hax occasionally touches on the mechanics of an advice column in her weekly chats at the Washington Post site, and it's fairly interesting.
posted by jacquilynne at 10:12 PM on January 27, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by brainmouse at 6:31 PM on January 24, 2011 [4 favorites]