Guest Post: On Interviewing your Typewriter

A guest post by Owen Jennings:

There are a number of pre-conditions essential for a successful interviewing of your typewriter.

Firstly, no decent typewriter should ever be interviewed by someone who does not have an agenda.  Agendas come in a variety of packages.  Mostly, there is more than one agenda in each package.  There is the climate agenda which entails writing inflammatory, exaggerated, world ending nonsense.  The anti-car, ‘walk, bike and bus’ agenda is regularly found in this package.  Along with a socialist agenda.  There is an ‘I love Jacinda’ agenda.  Another is known as the Maori separatist agenda.  It is always alongside an elitist agenda.  There is now only an occasional sighting of a right wing, capitalist package.

Secondly, typewriters dislike being interviewed by males, especially old, white, experienced, heterosexual males.  Today’s typewriters cannot anymore find words like integrity, probity, commonsense, balance, truth.  They have been replaced by conversation, gender identity, rainbow, soooo yesterday, engagement, learnings, my space, hurt feelings, fair.

Further, a typewriter should never be interviewed unless the interviewer is bored.  The state of boredom produces all manner of assumptions, hallucinatory incoherence, meretricious fakery.

Pyramid building is an essential element in expert typewriter interviewing.  It saves having to do all that grubby stuff like research, hard work, one-on-one interviews.  Take a quick look around among your fellow typewriting interviewers and see what salacious cozenage they are indulging in and simply throw some fuel on their fire.   Don’t get sidetracked with checking facts, going back to the source or anything too time consuming and potentially rumour killing.  Drinks are at 3.00pm and not starting till midday just makes that stuff too difficult.  It’s best if you can add a few of your own ‘facts’ just to avoid that nasty plagiarism nonsense.  Now get a fellow typewriter interviewer to build on your story – the sisterhood needs to stick together.

This technique works most effectively when undermining a politician is on the agenda.  It’s fun to hit on Opposition leaders – they are always vulnerable as they struggle for coverage.  You can ‘help’ with coverage with just 10 minutes interviewing of your typewriter.  The word ‘rumour’ is essential – no one can trip you on that.  Pick a likely cafe where you are sure a couple of plotting contenders could have been seen, throw in the old line, ‘doing the numbers’ and you have your story.  Anyone will buy this angle – they are not fussy.  Don’t sweat spelling and grammar.  Just build the pyramid.

One should never approach their typewriter if one is not feeling narcisstic or self important.  You will never produce a piece worthy of classic typewriter interviewing if you think you are a just another cog in a big wheel, a team player, or if you have any feelings of modesty, shame, self deprecation.  Rid yourself of such vile reactions. Celebrate your influence, stoke your self-worth, promote your amazing contribution to the world.

Lastly, an essential pre-condition for achieving success when interviewing your typewriter is to gain an understanding of how emotional, frothy, inane, trash has a big market.  What the Prime Minister has on her toast at 5.00am is far more important and newsworthy than the falling productivity rate in New Zealand Aotearoa.  It doesn’t matter whether you actually know what is on her toast – it is Prime Minister who is the story not the avocado.  You have to recognise the need to deflect.  Keep reminding yourself, “vegemite and avocado” not “lies about quarantine staff”.

There you are.  Sorted.  You are ready to take up a job at any MSM outlet.  Good pay, good job security.  Really is a state services job these days.