Debate over whether PR pros deserve sympathy rages

While one blogger is calling for some human kindness for the practitioners of an often thankless job, Gawker argues that pointing out the worst examples is necessary.

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The worst examples of public relations material is often derided in the media, and a writer/blogger Jennifer Pan says it should stop. She notes that PR—an industry generally dominated by women—tends to be a “grueling and mostly thankless” emotional labor “that can quickly lead to burnout.”

She writes in Jacobin magazine:

The palpable distaste for PR practitioners that continues to swell — spearheaded by the very same members of the media with whom publicists theoretically enjoy a symbiotic relationship — requires, then, a deeper look at how gendered assumptions about work continue to shape our contemporary notions of creative labor under capitalism.

Gawker, known for taking to task some of the more incomprehensible PR pitches, weighed in on the subject as well.

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