Grover, the furry blue Muppet from “Sesame Street,” is known for having held many jobs over the years, including astronaut and dentist. Now he is apparently a journalist.
“As a journalist, I always do my research before publishing an article,” he wrote Monday. X. “I feel confident in saying that you are so special and amazing! »
Some fellow journalists welcomed him into the profession, although with some mockery about the reliability of his reporting and his professionalism. “Who are your sources?“wrote Danielle Kurtzleben, a journalist at National Public Radio, who published a separate report about Grover’s foray into journalism.
Others predicted his career would be short given the dire state of the news industry, which has been hit by relentless rounds of layoffs and closures in recent months, while also battling reader fatigue.
“I regret to report that a hedge fund has since purchased Grover’s paper and terminated him,” wrote SP Sullivan, NJ.com reporter.
“Unfortunately, Grover was fired for not meeting his quota of three articles per day.” said Scott Nover, editor for Slate.
Grover’s handlers at Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization behind “Sesame Street,” did not immediately respond to questions about his employment status. But with his experience and his enthusiasm (he proposed its services as a “professionally trained referee” for ESPN host Stephen A. Smith and his self-portrait at the Metropolitan Museum of Art), he may find it easier than most to move to another industry if he needs to.
Grover, who is eager to help although sometimes incompetent, may have only wanted to cheer people up with his message. But it unintentionally highlights the increased precarity journalists have felt in recent months, even in an industry that has struggled to stay afloat in the digital age.
Since October, Bloomberg, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and The Wall Street Journal have all lost their jobs – sometimes by the hundreds. The Messenger, a lavishly funded online news outlet with offices in Washington, announced last month that it was closing its doors after less than a year in business.
The journalists’ dark humor directed at Grover reflected their own feelings about their “doomed industry”, said Cam Wilson, a journalist with Australian media outlet Crikey, who commented on about the Muppet’s new job.
“I feel so gloomy about the state of journalism that it drives me to crush the dreams of a Muppet character (and the poor social media worker who runs it),” he said in an interview carried out via direct messages on the platform.
It’s also unclear whether Kermit the Frog, a friend of Grover’s who worked as a reporter on “Sesame Street,” was able to weather the ups and downs of a changing industry.
From the 1970s to the 1990s, Kermit conducted live interviews and filed Flash Sesame Street News reports on recent events like the fall of Humpty Dumpty. He hasn’t filed a complaint in years, even though he was still call himself a “part-time journalist” on X as recently as 2016.
Two weeks ago, Grover’s pal Elmo received a deluge of humorous – and downright dark – responses when he asked the innocuous question, “How’s everyone?” » on
Why were people so inclined to involve these characters in their own worries and misfortunes? Mr. Wilson, the journalist, has a theory.
“I think people who jump on the tweets of children’s show characters see a little of their own naivety about the world of their youth reflected back in themselves and they don’t like it,” a he declared. “I include myself in this category.”
