Who owns your words?

The inevitable trauma of clickbait headlines

Well, it’s finally happened. I’ve had a clickbait headline slapped on one of my articles.

It’s an inevitability for freelance writers, and I suppose I should count myself lucky that it’s taken until now to happen to me. I’ve seen so many horror stories of writers submitting perfectly innocent pieces, only to wake up to a wave of angry comments, at which point they learn that an editor has put a headline on their work that makes it seems like their hobby is torturing puppies or something. By comparison, I got off lightly. But it still made me feel queasy to see how easily someone can shift the whole meaning of a piece and misrepresent your views.

Before I explain what happened, I need to tell you something that a lot of people don’t realise - the writer of an article almost never gets to write the headline. We submit with a title, but the editor will almost always change it to something different. One of the first things you learn as a freelancer is to not spend too much time on the title because it will never see the light of day. When I pitch a piece, I use a heading that I think will grab a commissioning editor’s attention and clearly sums up what the proposed article is about. Then, when I write the piece, I just use that title, knowing it is nothing more than a placeholder.

So when you see a headline, even if it sounds like an angry dog-whistle, try not to get automatically angry at the writer. Chances are, they never said whatever that headline says. Unless it’s Piers Morgan or Nigel Farage - they probably did say that thing.¹

Anyway, I was asked to write some pieces for a parenting column for a national newspaper, which was very exciting and I was thrilled. I’ve written for this paper quite a few times, and I’ve always found them absolutely wonderful to work with. The editor is lovely, they pay on time (and better than a lot of papers), and they have never misrepresented my pieces, which makes me feel totally comfortable sharing my opinions with them.

This led me to write a piece about community parenting. The title I put on my piece was:

I love it when my friends tell my children off

Essentially, my point was that it takes a village to raise a child, but most of us are missing that vital community support. I have a small group of friends who feel comfortable acting as parental figures for my children - including telling them when their behaviour’s not cool - and are happy for me to do the same with theirs. And I love it. When we get together, parenting becomes so much easier. The load doesn’t all fall on one or two people’s shoulders, there are other adults there to help, guide, explain why they shouldn’t lick each other, and be a calm presence when one parent is ready to lose their shit.

It’s beautiful. And I think the kids benefit, too, from having a range of adults they can trust and go to, not just their mum and dad.

So this is the headline that ran in the paper…

I made a friend’s child cry - but they need discipline and I won’t stop

Eep.

That headline sat right in between two pictures of my face, and right next to my name.

I mean, it’s right next to my face.

It makes me sound like I rampage around the south coast of England screaming at small children, despite their parents’ pleas that I be less of a dick.

The story I shared in the piece that this headline relates to was as follows. I share school runs with a friend who lives round the corner and whose child is at the same school as my kids. One morning, as we walked from my car to the school, my friend’s daughter ran into the road and I managed to leap in front of her just before she was smooshed by a car. I then had a gentle chat with her about why she shouldn’t run into the road. This kid is normally pretty robust, but she started sniffling and rubbing her eyes and I felt absolutely horrible. I tried to give her a hug but she was clearly not my biggest fan in that moment. I rang her mum after to say “oh my god I made your child cry I’m so sorry!!!” To which her mum just said, “She’s got to learn, I’m always telling her about that road. Maybe she’ll listen to you.”

I think this comment from ImaginaryLizzie, a reply when I posted about this on Notes, sums up the issue:

I mean, you would, wouldn’t you?

Which leads me to the headline of this piece: who owns your words?

We all accept that the author doesn’t get to write the headline because that’s the way it’s always been, but those of you who’ve been here for a while will know I’m not a fan of “because that’s the way it is” as an explanation. Those are the exactly the reasons that show something needs to change.

So why don’t authors get to write the headline? Or at least have some input into it. Obviously editors are going to want a say - and, indeed, they will fiddle with the whole piece, because that’s their job. To edit. But writing a headline from scratch isn’t editing. It’s writing. That’s the bit I’m getting paid for.

We all know, most people don’t read the whole piece. I can always guarantee that at least 75% of all comments on a piece I write - and any social media posts about it - will be from people who have not read the article. We’re all busy, and we’re scrolling through our phones while we’re supposed to be in a Zoom meeting, and we’re doing the weekly shop online, and our toddler is setting fire to their sibling’s hair, so of course we don’t have time for more than the headline. It’s easy to say we shouldn’t emotionally react without reading the whole piece, but it’s an entirely unreasonable expectation. We all do it. We can’t help it. In fact, editors engineer it that way - they want an emotional response fast so that we’ll engage.

The headline is the most important part of the piece.

Given that it’s all most people will read, and it’s right next to my damn face, shouldn’t I get a say?

I am incredibly lucky that, like I said, this particular editor is a lovely human being. When I sent her a bit of a panicked email to say I was worried people would now be labelling me as some kind of modern-day Childcatcher, she immediately offered to tone down the headline. She even let me choose from a few options, and then changed it straight away. So the piece now appears like this:

It’s not a revolutionary change, but, in my husband’s words, “This one does make you sound much less of a c**t.” And it does actually reflect the point of the piece, albeit you have to read it to find out why. But that’s the point of a good headline. So hopefully now we’re all happy.

But I know a lot of editors wouldn’t make that change. They’d just shrug their shoulders and say, “tough shit, you can try for a Childcatcher role in a local panto, we’ve done you a favour really.”

So, whilst I got off incredibly lightly, I can’t help but think we need a change of approach with this whole headline writing thing. Editors shouldn’t be able to twist people’s words, or quote them as saying things they’ve never said. Especially ones that are clearly fundamentally opposed to their actual views.

Writers should at least get sign-off on a headline before it goes live. And we won’t get that unless we all collectively push for it to be standard practice.

It starts with the big names - editors don’t care what I think, I’m easily replaceable. But if a star writer insisted on seeing the headline before the piece was published, they’d agree because they wouldn’t want to lose the name. Then, over time, hopefully it begins to be normalised.

If we all start asking to see the headline before it goes live, maybe they’ll get into the habit.

Next time you pitch an article, ask if you can see the headline before publication. They’ll probably say no, but it’s worth a try.

Until we can bring about a paradigm shift in this area, don’t judge a writer by their covering byline. Please!

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1. Legal disclaimer: Piers Morgan and Nigel Farage probably don’t write their own headlines either. Don’t get angry at them. Or anyone. Especially those two - they’re not worth your energy and they’re only doing it for attention.