Save for the name, I used the headline above back in April for a post about actress Janeane Garofalo, but sometimes simplicity, and redundancy, make a point. And Chris Needham of NBC Washington — like Garofalo and others who arrogantly trash rednecks and hillbillies and West Virginians and people in “flyover country” — is a bigot, plain and simple.

Needham typically covers sports but apparently thought it would be a fun journalistic change of pace to cover a completely foreign topic, e-government in West Virginia, and in the process insult an entire group of people — my people.

“West Virginia Discovers the Internet,” he mocked in the headline. He then derided the Mountain State as “our yokel neighbors to the West” and told lies about her people living in “tar-paper shacks,” lacking electricity and “pooping in the backyard.” (Note to Needham: The word “West” isn’t capitalized when it’s a directional reference rather than a reference to the states in the West. We yokels learned that in journalism school at West Virginia University.)

NBC quickly yanked the article, but thankfully, West Virginia native (born and raised just a few miles from my home town, Paden City) and fellow journalist Jacque Jo Bland posted the screen capture linked above on her blog, Girl of Words, for posterity. She also smacked down Needham quite effectively, and considering that Bland and I followed similar paths to where we are today, all I have to say is, “What she said!”:

Someone as poor, disadvantaged, backwards and well, stupid, as me got to the same city you did. Ouch. You didn’t think a place like D.C. hired toothless, cousin-molesting inbreeders from West Virginia, did you?

Oh, and Chris? I’m not the only one. Several of your colleagues in this city are native West Virginians. None of us are too pleased with you right now.

Sure, NBC pulled the article, but conveniently, you’re “out this week,” and so is your boss. Knowing coward moves like that, you’re hoping you can ride this out over Christmas week and let it go, never to be seen or heard from again.

But, Chris? I’m not going to forget. I’ve made it my mission to meet you in person, now. I want you to have to look into the face of a hardworking, proud West Virginian and try to justify what you did.

Here’s fair warning: I’m not going to accept, “It was just a joke.”

The joke here, Chris, is you. The victim, unfortunately, is journalism, and on behalf of those of us fighting to keep our profession respected, thanks for the black eye.

Rather than hiding the transgression and dodging responsibility, NBC Washington should force Needham to apologize on its site — and offer a similarly transparent apology of its own for giving a bigot free reign to the site. Although NBC issued an apology, blogger Teresa O’Cassidy rightly noted at Buzzardbilly that “it is a half-handed apology from an unspecified source to only one news outlet. … There is no mention of this apology on NBC Washington’s Web site whatsoever.”

That will do nothing to heal journalism’s black eye or correct the record now that NBC Washington has perpetuated false stereotypes about West Virginia.

Here is roundup of what others have said about the controversy:

• Don Surber of the Charleston Daily Mail: “Needham even offered an online link to a list of marriage certificates in West Virginia on which the bride and the groom are both named ‘Smith.’ Yes, that only happens in 50 of the 50 states.”
• Karl Johnson, a West Virginia native who blogs at We Love DC (yes, many of us West Virginia natives practice journalism in the nation’s capital): “It is so ridiculous that a supposedly reputable news network in one of the largest and most important media markets in the country would publish something like this.”
• A Better West Virginia ironically noted the best answer to a blogger bashing West Virginia as being too backward for the Internet: “Today, one of the best tools for challenging misconceptions is the Internet. Unlike the days in which people had little means of publicly defending their image, the slighted can now stand up virtually and educate others as to the realities of who they are.” (That’s the whole point of The Enlightened Redneck!)
• Melissa DelGaudio at Honeybee: “Each and every state in our union has its share of poverty. Each has stereotypes with which it deals on a daily basis. For West Virginia to be singled out time and again is wholly unacceptable. That a major news outlet felt that posting this article was OK is patently offensive.”

But enough of that. Christmas Day starts in about two hours, and I hate that I’m even writing about something this offensive on Christmas Eve. So in the spirit of the season, Chris Needham, I forgive you. Just please set the record straight.