As told to me by a valued Stenonymous reader:

“Hi, Christopher. [REDACTED]. I was a decades-long practicing [REDACTED] court reporter, and [REDACTED]. I edited my own work, so I was well aware of my good days and bad days. I started scoping/editing full time for reporters in around [REDACTED]. I am still scoping/ editing for reporters from all over the US — [REDACTED]. I have to say I am extremely disappointed and dismayed at the lack of qualifications I have experienced from the majority of these reporters. I find they are dropping an extraordinary amount of text, at times 15-20% and I am typing in the missing text for the reporters. This is not a one-off or occasional occurrence. I only bring this up to you because of the threat this industry is facing re AI, digital recorders, big box corporations, etc. I don’t know if this is a subject you (gingerly) would consider addressing in your Stenonymous articles – which I thoroughly enjoy, by the way. You are a driving force in the fight to save this industry. I do not expect a response from you. I am asking that you please keep this writing anonymous and confidential.”

I have to say that I have been a voice for quality in our field since before Stenonymous’s time. We used to have this weird mannerism in the profession where we had to pretend we were all perfect and never made mistakes. That may seem like a foreign concept to students of this day and age, whose mentors seem more willing to say everyone makes mistakes. It was never true that we didn’t. Being in New York City, I saw firsthand the degradation of skill in the stenographic reporter. By the time I came into the field, audio had become ubiquitous and many were reliant on it to the point where they couldn’t pass the civil service test that the state eliminated a few months ago. And worse, people pretended, and encouraged others to pretend, that the audio was not in use.

As best I can tell, this was under pressure from agencies, who were under pressure from high-strung clients. The Introverted Lawyer, Heidi Kristin Brown, once spoke to a crowd of court reporters about the nastiness she’d experienced in the legal field. I’ve met that nastiness too. So I understand the wilting nature of the court reporter and its agencies. Without each other to hold us up, it is easy for outside influences to cause us to feel less than — and it is easy for the people holding the wallet to screw any individual “person” out of a day’s pay. That’s understandably scary.

But I never ran from the digital problem or the misinformation campaign spread by the corps. I can’t run from ours either. This is not the first scopist to mention this to me. Probably won’t be the last.

I’ve been on jobs where using the audio as a crutch would’ve made the transcripts unusable.

I’ve been on jobs where the audio was a must because I was physically prevented from interrupting (think public meetings).

I’ve been on jobs where I used audio as a crutch.

I’ve been on jobs where I’ve been ordered not to use audio even where others factually do.

I hired a scopist once who called my writing “labyrinthian.” Haven’t hired one since.

I understand, more than anyone (hyperbole), the importance of the use of the tool, where appropriate.

But if you’re at the point where you’re dropping a fifth of the testimony in your stenographic note taking, it’s time to identify and correct that issue. And might I suggest that the issue is likely that you never learned to “control a room” because you used audio as a crutch. And that’s okay. It’s what you do with the future that counts. Making mistakes in our line of work is a much smaller problem than taking no action to correct them.

Those “button pushers” we denigrate? Some of them are better. Think about the ones that are honest about who they are and what they do. What do we have on them? Isn’t that what all this is about? Speaking out against corporate dishonesty and corner cutting because the transcript is important? I know some of them have told me they were trained to lie, obfuscate, or even provide fake names (cough, cough, Naegeli rumor, cough, worst court reporting company in the country?) But for the ones that are honest and feed us info, aren’t they “on our side?”

Maybe I’m kidding myself.

Maybe everybody’s afraid of the truth?

After all, you don’t think people in positions of power have heard my allegations? I sent them directly to a judge quoted in an article about us once. You think he wrote back?

People so afraid of looking foolish they’d rather promote a comfortable lie or ignore a terrible wrong than look at a situation with the analytical nuance that they do any day-to-day issue or case. It’s not their job. Why care? And the people whose job it is? They can make up excuses ad infinitum why they can’t care right now without consequence or accountability. This is why my publishing strategy is to get louder and louder until they all look like assholes for ignoring it. I don’t see another way forward. Doesn’t anyone else get it? Being nice to people that deny the truth got us where we are.

Reader, in a world of evil apes and ostriches, be a lion.

Or a sheepdog.

P.S.

Anyone actually good at fundraising/P.R./sales? Maybe we can make a deal and split donations. It’s a gamble. I can go months with minimal funding or make $1,000 in a day. It’s not like the money isn’t there to turn this into a small media operation. It just needs to be redirected a little bit. My real-life friends are too busy to help, so I leave it up to my readership.

Having our marriage ceremony soon. It’ll probably get pretty quiet on here for a while. Thanks for putting up with my double-post days these last few weeks. Have a wonderful weekend.

Ever eager to be a platform for your…

Addendum:

Toward the end of March 29th, Erin Blair made a comment that I asked to share with my audience. They are a respected member of the field, so I’m happy to share their views with my audience.

We also had a brief discussion where I tried to explain I don’t mean to victim blame and believe the issue is nuanced.