No, they’re not – and so they won’t always have the context some writers assume they do. Probably best to make it crystal clear which is which.

Agree on all points, Sharon. That’s the same thing I was taught. Don’t lead the story EVER. Let the story emerge, and accept what that story ends up being.

I think some publications (not a majority, but a good number) could make it much clearer what is opinion and what isn’t. I was reading an opinion piece this past week that was clearly an opinion based on how it was written — but the Opinion header was so obscure it was easily missed.

And someone I know did miss it, then went on a full-blown rant, to the paper as well as to the general public, about the missing “facts” in the opinion piece. It could have been avoided entirely if the paper had taken more care to call that out as opinion.

A good number of publications could do a better job of it. I think they may be under the antiquated assumption that their readers know what’s opinion and what isn’t. But not all readers these days are local, are they?

That doesn’t matter so much with how-to articles, but even in others, where there are pieces of research on a topic with slightly differing slants, I’ll include them so readers can make their own minds up.

As for opinion, I make it clear when something is my opinion and when it’s a statement backed by external evidence.

By the way, the discussion last week reminded me of debates my students had about this issue when I was teaching journalism at Coventry University – good fun! 🙂