It is sensationalism. It is seedy tabloid style journalism if you don't like it, and it is creative wordplay if you do, Bucco. It has been around since the dawn of time. You are right, Bucco. The Huffington Post and The New York Post are two examples of media who uses sensationalism headlines with just enough of a twist to make something seem a certain way but if you bother to read the story, you realize you may have been mislead. If someone is too lazy to read the entire story, whose to blame?
I've seen it many times on TOTV and other forums where someone will post an article and write a their own "headline" and editorialize the article. Sometimes it is flame bait and many people will comment without having ever read the story. It is used to get reactions and it usually works. I never liked that style of writing. I like creative headlines but not sensational headlines that push for a reaction when there isn't a story to back it up.
You have to remember too that most headlines are written by someone other than the writer of the article. Like Bonnevie said, they are also written as space allows. Oftentimes the headline comes with the story and the copy editor putting the page together doesn't bother reading the entire story and just crops the headline to fit the space. So, the OPs story may have had the word vegetable in it but it got
cut out.
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