June 2023 Monthly Roundup
What’s up, Waywards reader?
You’re now looking at the second monthly roundup I’ve pieced together. This one lists articles I authored for commission that were published during the month of June.
Here are pieces I wrote that got published this month:
IE groups visit Amazon HQ in Seattle to call on company to #DeliverChange / The Frontline Observer / 6-2-23
Guys, Your Well-Being Is in Your Hands: Male Masturbation Is Healthy / Giddy / 6-12-23
At Slow Bloom, Unionized Baristas Are Their Own Bosses / Fresh Cup / 6-14-23
Ending CDCR-ICE Punishment System A Priority for California’s Immigrant Rights Advocates / The Frontline Observer / 6-26-23
Teamsters build on Palmdale strike momentum with picket at Mira Loma Amazon facility / The Frontline Observer / 6-28-23
Per the new norm, I’ll also share a few work and life updates in this post.
I’ll be teaching two community college courses in the fall.
I stepped away from the “adjunct life” for two years after my mom died in July 2021.
I’d been considering a career pivot prior to that. Teaching multiple classes whenever possible (e.g. fall, winter, spring and summer terms) for rather meager — or simply egregiously low — income burns and churns out many would-be academics and educators. In addition to teaching at a local community college, I had also been lecturing in the media and cultural studies department at UC Riverside, and the department had had no classes to offer me for the 2021-2022 academic year.
All of that combined provided the necessary impetus to throw myself into full-time freelance work for a while. I’d freelanced off and on off and on over the years.
Some months freelancing has seemed sustainable. There have been months that I pulled in more than I did as an adjunct. Other months have been less than lucrative, to say the least.
So I intend to split time between freelance and adjunct work going forward, starting in the fall, for a while anyway.
My hope is wearing both hats will help prevent burnout, on both ends.
I miss aspects of academic life.
I also enjoy reporting, researching and writing. And I enjoy receiving some compensation for written work, however modest. I wouldn’t get that if I were only teaching classes as an adjunct. But I can receive some remuneration when I get freelance pitches commissioned.
Will combining freelance work and lecturing be enough to pay rent and bills? Time will tell, Waywards reader. Time will tell.
In other news, the IWW Freelance Journalists Union legal committee I co-chair with photographer, journalist and editor Ben Camacho has just unveiled an intake form for those requesting legal assistance related to freelance work. If you’re a freelance journalist who’s encountered legal trouble as a result of the work you do and think FJU might be able to help, if only indirectly, the form is for you.
With respect to my present freelancer grind, I have a few commissioned pieces I submitted previously — months ago, in more than one instance — that might get published in July. One I referenced in my May 2023 Monthly Roundup ought to be online early next week, in fact, thanks in large part to editors who actually respect freelance labor and value attempts at crafting worthwhile journalism.
This past month I also put together several pitches that editors ignored or passed on, politely and with encouragement in some cases, pretentiously in others.
I tried to get a story commissioned about a report from Human Rights Watch that documents how nonprofit hospitals receive billions of dollars in public subsidies to provide free or reduced price health care yet only use a portion of those public dollars on that kind of care. I did that to no avail, though one editor riffed on the idea and expressed interest in a tangentially related piece.
I pitched more than one outlet a piece about nurses mobilizing against VA management using police intimidation to stifle union advocacy. The light never turned green on that one.
After watching the miniseries A Small Light, I emailed at least two outlets an idea for an article about how humanizing humor shines through catastrophe in the show and elucidates how preserving joy amid the unconscionable helps remind us of our humanity. That was evidently not a good fit, whatever that means, for the publications I contacted.
In light of the Scotch Whisky Association’s stated goal of achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2040 while moving toward a circular economy, and given recently published research along the same lines, I came up with a story idea about it being easier now to enjoy sustainably produced scotch. I threw that at a few editors, without success.
I tried to get at least two higher education news organizations to commission a piece about the University of California defying collective bargaining agreements and withholding pay owed academic workers, but commission for that story was also withheld.
A profile piece I pitched about a married couple who offer yoga and Tai Chi classes at their studio, intimating the two practices might be considered a match made in heaven, has received no response so far.
Having read reporting based on internal documents about how the Syngenta corporation seemingly mislead people about the dangers of one of its products, the herbicide paraquat, I tried to get the go-ahead for a piece about newly studied prospects for ameliorating paraquat-induced adverse health effects; the story would’ve been buttressed by interviews with farmers and farm workers who could speak to how they’ve avoided or addressed paraquat exposure. Given the dearth of responses, I evidently tried in vain there too.
Drawing on a new study from the Southern Rural Black Women’s Initiative, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and the Community Broadband Networks Initiative, I also wanted to write a piece about how universal broadband could improve health outcomes and reduce costs in rural communities. But you can’t always get what you want, as the Stones understood and the lack of affirmative reply to my pitch attests.
Just prior to doing a little pre-reporting on the above, I got my hopes up about maybe getting to profile the winners of the upcoming 85+ men’s basketball competition at the 2023 National Senior Games going down next month. The lack of a reply to that pitch suggests editors did not share my enthusiasm for what I maintain would be a tremendous story.
Oh, and in early June I pitched a media-oriented outlet a reported essay based on the idea payment upon submission of a commissioned piece, not upon publication, should be the norm in the freelance writing world. I still dig the idea, and the idea of arguing for it in article form. But the crickets that chirped after I pitched perhaps underscore what many already know; that is, it’ll take more than good ideas to transform undesirable media and freelance labor relations.
Any of those aforementioned story ideas could get recycled and might even appear in published form on a future monthly roundup. Again, time will tell.
For now, I’ll bid you adieu, Waywards reader, but not before sharing a screenshot photo from video I recorded of myself shooting hoops this week at Sycamore Highlands Park here in Riverside:
Until next time!