Platell: still a hypocrite and just unbelievably lazy

If it's Saturday, it must be another feeble column from Amanda Platell in the Mail.

What does she write about today? Sex education in schools (covered in the Mail on 6 Nov), Fern Britton doing a religious chat show on BBC (covered in the Mail on 5 Nov), Drew Barrymore in a frock (covered in the Mail on 5 Nov), the U2 Berlin concert (covered in the Mail on 6 Nov), an attack on Helen Goodman over expenses (covered in the Mail on 6 Nov), Wayne Rooney celebrating the birth of his son until 6am (covered in the - gasp - Sun on 5 Nov), a sex discrimination case (covered in the Mail on 4 Nov), Gordon Ramsay's viewing figures (covered in the Mail on 5 Nov), an attack on Obama over Fort Hood (which appears to be straight from Fox News) and something about Slavica Ecclestone and the Dalai Lama (covered in the Mail on 4 Nov).

The only bit of her column that hasn't appeared somewhere else in the last three days is praise for Margaret Thatcher. And that can hardly be called 'new'.

Does she have an original thought in her head? And that doesn't include the lies. Any moron could flick through the papers, find a few stories to re-heat and add some unamusing insults.

And clearly, any moron does.

Let's start with Gordon Ramsay. She writes:

Ramsay's celebrity The F Word attracted just 1.8million viewers, with even BBC2's science series Horizon beating him with an aptly titled show called Who's Afraid Of A Big Black Hole? - into which we can all now hope the foulmouthed Ramsay will finally disappear.

If she feels that strongly about stopping media exposure for Gordon Ramsay, she should complain to the newspaper that just yesterday published five recipes from his latest 'brilliant book'. That would be the same newspaper she writes for.

On to her comments about Barack Obama, who she clearly hates. In recent weeks she has said he has no charisma and criticised Michelle for hula-hooping. And now? This about Obama's press conference - a few hours after the event and without all the facts - on the Fort Hood shootings:

He seemed very slow to react and spent much time initially ignoring the tragedy, thanking staff for organising a conference in Washington that he'd been attending.

It was only some time later that he spoke of the 'horrific outburst of violence'. His performance reminded me of President Bush's numb response when he was first told that two jet airliners had flown into the Twin Towers on September 11.

Now this is what really happened. He was indeed at a conference, as the BBC reported:

The first annual White House Tribal Nations Conference brings together one delegate from each of the 564 federally recognised American Indian tribes.

It is the first time in US history that they will all meet a sitting president.

So when Obama got up to speak he wasn't 'ignoring the tragedy' but thanking the organisers and attendees for this historic event. He gave a shout-out to a Congressional Medal of Honor recipient who was there, and gave a 'solemn guarantee that this was not the end of a process but the beginning of a process' on Native American rights.

What Platell calls 'much time' before he addressed Fort Hood was in fact - wait for it - 113 seconds.

When she claims it was 'only some time later that he spoke of the 'horrific outburst of violence'' was in fact 31 seconds into his remarks on the shootings and within three minutes of beginning his speech.

Not that the events on 11 September and at Fort Hood are comparable but Platell seems to forget Bush carried on reading 'The Pet Goat' for seven minutes after being told of the second plane hitting the World Trade Center. And then he went...where?

Is she really so pathetically biased that she thinks those two reactions are the same?

As usual, there are also some bitter attacks on women who are more successful and popular than she is. She refers to Fern Britton as:

The Big Fat Fibber

who was:

so unpopular with viewers that ratings for ITV's This Morning have soared since she was replaced as a presenter

Yes, the Mail (who else?) did report viewing figures have risen by 150,000 but how much of this is down to a new presenter and re-launched programme? And if she was 'so unpopular', how come she was presenting the show for eight years, and still managing to pull in nearly a million viewers?

But maybe with unpopular fibbers, it just takes one to know one...

And then there is a nasty and gratuitous attack on Drew Barrymore:

Drew Barrymore's appearance, wearing Posh's purple £1,750 Giral dress, made her look like a leading lady all right, but not the A-lister she hoped - more the poisonous cross-dressing Rosa Klebb in the James Bond movie From Russia With Love.

Aside from the factual error of calling Klebb a 'leading lady', this is what Drew looked like:


And this is Rosa Klebb:


Identical, as you can see.

The Mail, a few days earlier, had said Barrymore looked 'stunning' at the same event, although that might be to make up for stupidly saying she looked like a lapdancer the last time she was at a premiere.

But remember last week when Platell complained about Frankie Boyle's Rebecca Adlington joke as:

cruel, unfunny - and, above all, unjust.

Apparently, comparing the 34-year old Barrymore - whose recent directorial debut has been very well received - to a notoriously unattractive, 65-year old, poisonous, cross-dressing assassin, is totally just and completely hilarious.

Poisonous indeed.

From the 'world's greatest newspaper': a front page about tea

When it could be reporting on the Fort Hood shootings or a speech by the Prime Minister on Afghanistan or any other really important news story, the - ahem - 'vastly improved standards of writing' at the Express are put to use with a front page about tea being good for you:

Plus - a lot of cut-price junk.

It's almost beyond parody now.

A shooter's religion is only relevant when he's Muslim

A shooting at an office block in Florida comes one day after the shooting at an army base in Texas. Here's how the Mail is currently covering the two stories:

So while the religion of the first shooter is considered so important it makes the headline, the religion of the second is not mentioned at all.

Presumably, they don't think 'Jason Rodriguez' sounds like a Muslim name. And therefore, they don't give a damn what religion he is.

Peter Hill actually believes the Express is the 'world's greatest newspaper'

Ciar Byrne has a two page article about the Express and its Editor Peter Hill in the latest Press Gazette. As a former media correspondent at the Guardian and Independent, Byrne has produced a very disappointing piece which doesn't challenge Hill on his coverage of Diana and Madeleine McCann or the horrendous, biased and very often fictional coverage of immigration, Muslims and other minorities.

She writes:

Hill does not wish to give a 'set-piece interview' at present, but he is happy to defend the Express and its management against their critics.

Which implies she was restricted in what she was allowed to ask. In which case, ignore him. If he can't answer questions about the stream of lies his paper puts out, the racist propaganda, the huge court payouts, the ludicrous conspiracy theories, the adverts-as-editorial for which the paper has been rebuked four times, the fact so much of his dreadful paper is now advertising and the fact he and his proprietor are liars, then why bother talking to him at all?

What he does say is rubbish such as:

I believe the standards of writing have vastly improved

and isn't challenged on it. Most of the time, the question about any Express story is not whether it contains a good standard of writing (it usually doesn't) but whether it's even true (it often isn't). Exercise is good for you, it's going to be warm for a few days and the puppy who wasn't stamped to death have all been on the front page in the last week or so. This is a vastly improved standard of writing and journalism?

Apparently so. Hill is also allowed to say about the Express:

It's the world's greatest newspaper. That's what it says on the front. It must be true.

Yeh, like those 90 consecutive McCann stories which were all completely accurate. Or the puppy and EU income tax fictions.

But here's the thing - how can the Express write 'THE WORLD'S GREATEST NEWSPAPER' in caps on the masthead every day? It must surely rank only slightly above the Star and Sport as the third worst newspaper in Britain, let alone the world. It's not the greatest on sales, or on awards (unless that is libel awards, paid out...), or by any other criteria.

The ASA say it is not advertising so it can't do anything. Is it even worth asking the PCC...?

How the Mail and Sun reported the Nick Griffin court case

On Monday, the Daily Mail was reporting on the case of Tauriq Khalid, who was in court accused of racially abusing and threatening to kill BNP leader Nick Griffin. It appeared in the first section of the Mail website homepage, as one of their top stories, like this:

On the actual article, in the blue bar at the top of the screen, the 'court hears' bit is missing. Moreover, the headline has been changed to:

Yes, it's partly in quote marks - a favourite tabloid get-out to attribute to someone else a statement they believe - but there is still something very definite about the phrasing. Probaby because in the toss up between a Muslim and a white racist, the Mail would always side with the latter.

Khalid said he called Griffin a 'fucking wanker' and aimed a V-sign in his direction.

Griffin said Khalid called him a 'white bastard', made a gun with his fingers and, according to the BNP leader:

He shouted out, "Griffin, you bastard. I am going to..." but I didn't at the time catch it. But I took it as to "kill" or "shoot you"

So he admitted in court he didn't actually hear the alleged death threat.

The jury took a whole 45 minutes to find Khalid not guilty. Which means a court has listened to something Griffin had to say and didn't believe him. Imagine that.

But how did the Mail react to the news that Khalid was cleared of racist abuse?

Firstly, they couldn't even be bothered to give a named journalist the assignment. Rather than James Tozer, who wrote the original story, 'Daily Mail Reporter' did it instead.

Secondly, the story has not been on the Mail homepage at all today and wasn't last night either - in complete contrast to the high positioning of the 'claims'.

Thirdly, the headline on the article is this:


Notice how the possibly guilty 'Muslim' from the original has become an innocent 'Asian'. In fact, the word 'Muslim' is not used once in the entire article about the verdict. Can the Mail not bring itself to think a Muslim man might not be guilty of something? Or is it that Khalid is not in fact Muslim? None of the other newspaper stories about the verdict identify him as such - in which case why did the Mail claim he was in the original headline?

The differences between the two articles and the prominence given to them is stark. And, sadly, unsurprising.

Still, at least they covered the end of the case in some form. On the Sun's website, Griffin's claims were reported, but the verdict hasn't been mentioned at all.

Here's the details of some TV sex you shouldn't watch, says Mail

The Mail's latest 'ban this sick filth'-type article comes in the form of a rant against HBO vampire series True Blood. Olivia Lichtenstein - who else? - writes:

True Blood is a shocking tale of depravity, explicit sexuality (bordering on pornography) and vile language. Even before the opening credits have rolled in the first episode, we see a young woman pleasuring a young man while driving her car.

That's just before a picture of the two leads having sex. Just so you can see how depraved it is. She continues:

There's oral sex, overt discussion of genitalia, graphic sex scenes bordering on the deviant, and foul language. We see a man having sex with a woman while watching a video of the same woman having sex with a vampire. The excitement engendered in the pair leads to rough sex and results in her murder.

Blimey! How outrageous! This is something that should never be seen! Oh:

it airs on one of our terrestrial channels at 10pm on Wednesdays.

The three mentions of Channel 4 make sure no one can possibly miss an episode now that our concerned journalist has told everyone when and where it is on and all the juicy details about what is in it. But Lichtenstein adds, apparently with no self-awareness:

I can't help but worry that children will find their way to this programme

Yes, they will now.

In fact, last week's episode of True Blood received just over one million viewers, so it's not exactly pulling in a huge audience. And this is the Mail - whose website has made it a priority to include as many pictures of half-naked slebs as possible. Indeed, its lead picture story this morning involved a pornstar.

The rant widens out into an attack on the state of television in general:

But a glance at our schedules reveals that sex, violence and vulgar language have become the staples that make up the British TV diet.

A 'glance' at 'our schedules' for tonight reveals no such thing: Watchdog, New Tricks, Question Time, The Restaurant, Defying Gravity, The Culture Show, Emmerdale, The Bill, Coronation Street, The Schoolboy Who Sailed the World, football and Location, Location, Location.

Of course, there are programmes with sex, violence and/or swearing but for every The Sopranos there's a My Family. And really, who would rather watch the latter? Why must adults be force-fed cookery, property and reality shows and soaps?

Frankly, it is highly unlikely that you will watch something with lots of sex, violence and swearing by accident. If you don't want to watch such programmes, turn them off. This faux outrage about television and films for grown-ups is incredibly boring.

Look at the most watched TV of 2008 - there's not one show there that wouldn't be classed as fairly safe family viewing.

But it doesn't end there. Lichtenstein's problem is with the internet too:

instant recording facilities and the internet, it's increasingly difficult to monitor children's viewing. Worryingly for parents, one quarter of 12 to 15-year-olds watch television or film content via websites (such as BBC iPlayer, Sky Player or ITV Player).

Does she really think teenagers with internet access in their bedrooms who are looking for a bit of sex are going to go to 4OD to watch True Blood (and, of course, risk seeing Noel Edmonds)? Of course they won't given what they could find on the web.

Then, in a statement along the lines of 'I'm not racist but...', she adds:

I am far from being a prude, but I find myself longing for the days when, in a movie, if a couple were kissing or lying on a bed, they had to keep one foot on the ground.

Yes, if only she had made Don't Look Now instead of Nic Roeg.

Of course, this is the same Olivia Lichtenstein who, back in March, watched a load of porn, just to say how disgusting it was. She included this paragraph, which was clearly imperative to her argument:

a man orders two 'take-away bimbos' over the telephone. They arrive, a specifically requested unmatched pair, one blonde, the other brunette, and under his gaze fondle and undress each other like automatons, mouthing filthy words of encouragement and pleading with him to join in. He does.

The article, which complained about the exploitation of women, included several screenshots of porn, including three girls kissing, a woman in the shower, and two bums in thongs.

She appears to be the go-to person when the Mail wants someone to look at representations of sex and say how awful and corrupting they are - she's also written about cybersex, internet porn addiction and erotic magazines for women.

Yet, strangely enough, she keeps accepting assignments which exposes her to more of the stuff. Could it possibly be that all this 'depravity' isn't as bad as she makes out for Mail readers? That grown-ups can watch grown-up material without being eternally damaged?

Or is it that people such as her can watch it, but you shouldn't?

Express front page - not only pointless, but untrue

Remember this story from last week?

At the time this blog suggested that it seemed a bizarrely insignificant story to put on the front page of a newspaper, yet coming after the fictitious EU income tax and the 'it's going to be warm for a few days' ones, it seemed to fit with the Express' desire to be as pointless and uninteresting as possible.

'What has happened to our country?' the paper thundered, as it reported on a puppy that had been viciously stamped to death by thugs.

It wasn't the only media outlet to report it, but the only one to give it such prominence. It's as if certain newspapers are willing to believe anything that makes Britain seem violent, out-of-control, awful.

So what has happened to our country?

Apparently, not much:

An inquiry into the "kicking to death" of a 10-week-old puppy has ended after police found the animal had died from a virus and showed no sign of injury.

Oh.

(Hat tip to James)

Express website thinks bra advert is news

Here's a screenshot from the story that is currently fifth highest in the UK news section of the Express website:


Yes, it's an advert for a bra. Sorry, a miracle bra. It also appears on the OK! magazine website - which also happens to be owned by Richard Desmond - so no doubt they have paid handsomely for the coverage.

The article, which begins with the curious question:

Cleavage like crepe paper?

even includes a link to the manufacturer's website.

This is the third time in recent months that an advert has been listed in the Express' news section. Surely the Advertising Standards Authority should be slapping Desmond's knuckles for this, as they did over the printed ads-as-editorial.

Payouts latest

In early September, the Daily Mail published this apology to Kate Winslet:

An article on 30 January 2009 compared Miss Winslet’s appearance with comments she made about having “stopped exercising”. We accept that Miss Winslet was not being duplicitous in making her comments or seeking to deliberately mislead about her exercise regime. We apologise for any distress caused.

Now the paper has coughed up £25,000 in libel damages on top of that apology. The original article, entitled Should Kate Winslet win an Oscar for the world's most irritating actress?, and was written by Liz Jones.

Elsewhere, the Guardian has apologised and paid damages to Steve Bunce following claims from Marina Hyde that he had used a website to get his sports show back on air after the collapse of TV channel Setanta.

Do you think the Mail is trying to suggest something?

Six stories from the current homepage of the Mail website:

Anyone would think the Mail is trying to imply Britain is over-run by criminal, benefit-scrounging immigrants and violent, would-be terrorist Muslims.

Oh wait...

And yet there is no mention on the Mail website of an incident from Rochdale where a 17 year old girl was:

subjected to racist taunts, including a chant of ‘BNP’ and obscenities.

Shortly after, the victim was grabbed by her headscarf by the boy and punched in the face by the girl, with such force that the pendant from her bracelet broke off and became stuck in the victim’s cheek.

It later had to be removed by doctors after the girl was taken to Rochdale Infirmary.

The girl:

sustained a fractured eye socket, a deep cut and severe bruising in the attack

The oldest of the gang of four attackers has pleaded guilty to public order offences and been fined. Of the rest:

The boy pleaded guilty to common assault, while the girl who punched the victim pleaded guilty to causing actual bodily harm.

The pair have been warned they could face custodial sentences when they are sentenced next month.

The other 16-year-old girl pleaded guilty to a public order offence.

Given their (questionable) front page today on random attacks by thugs, why is the Mail not interested in that case?

Why in their reporting of the racist murder of Mohammed al-Majed did they use a headline that implied one person was involved - Thug convicted of killing 16-year-year-old Arab student in racist attack - when three men had actually been convicted for their part in the attack (one for racially aggravated common assault and the third for wounding with intent)?

And what about the case of BNP activist and European Parliamentary candidate David Lucas, who has been charged with:

possession of explosives under suspicious circumstances, possession of an explosives substance without an explosives licence, possession of a prohibited weapon, possession of ammunition with intent to endanger life, possession of ammunition without a firearms certificate and two counts of possession of prohibited ammunition.

Predictably, the Mail has forgotten to report on that, too.

Yet another news-free Express front page

Further stunning revelations on the front of the Express after their barrel-scraping 'it's going to be warm for a few days' one last week.

There is 'news' that the weather isn't going to be quite so good for a few days, but their main headline is one of their 'miracle cure' classics.

Now: exercise is good for you.


How would we manage without the Express?

Mail now looks silly after attack on BBC's spelling

The Mail on Sunday has relished attacking the BBC - yet again - for a spelling mistake on last Wednesday's News at Ten.

The error over spelling 'damning' as 'damming' was noted on Thursday, so it does seem odd to mention it several days later. Or maybe not, given the Mail's utterly obsessive anti-BBC agenda. Tom Harper's report was headlined: Here is the news: the BBC is no damm good at spelling.

The problem is, when you pick on other people for their spelling and/or grammar, you really should make sure your own is up to scratch.

But the Mail website's report on the latest X Factor contains this barely intelligible sentence:


So 'her' becomes 'his' and 'send home' becomes 'save home'.

And then there is:


And, er this:


Here is the news: the Mail now looks a bit stupid.

Actress in bikini gets Mail's attention (shock)

The Mail website's latest news-free picture story of a famous woman in a bikini comes in the form of Christina Ricci shows off new boyfriend and a stunning bikini body on Miami Beach minibreak.

Ricci, apparently, 'stunned fellow beachgoers' as she 'flaunted a fantastic figure' notes Daily Mail Reporter before leeringly observing 'she was forced to readjust her bikini top as she stepped out of the surf.'

Her body is described as 'stunning' and 'enviably thin' just to reinforce the impression the Mail thinks very thin is the only 'enviable' body shape.

But could this be the same 'stunning' body as the one they said was covered in 'tacky tattoos' a year ago?

And the same 'stunning' body that they tried to make was underweight when they referred to her 'increasingly thin frame' in an article with several references to Ricci's eating disorders?

Becasue her body shape and size looks much the same in all three articles.

Mail readers think death of illegal immigrant is 'good news'

Five Chinese Crackers has highlighted just how horrendous some Mail readers are, following the comments left on the story Migrant found dead in the back of a lorry as it prepares to enter Channel Tunnel.

The thirteen comments so far all revel in the death of this person, and they are all rated positive from +47 to +120. Here's some the 'best':

one down, millions to go
- crackers, yorkshire, 31/10/2009 2:42

Good news. One less to worry about!
- keith jones, porthcawl, south wales, 30/10/2009 22:13

Shame but I would be a hypocrit if I said I was sorry!
- Nanny B, West Sussex, 30/10/2009 17:42

Has the Mail's constant attacks on immigrants (illegal or otherwise) now meant that they have become so de-humanised that the death of one of them is a cause for celebration and described as 'good news'? Are there really hundreds of Mail readers happy to call for the deaths of 'millions' of people?

And - as 5CC asks - are the advertisers happy that their wares are associated with this story and these comments?

The wit and wisdom of Eamonn Holmes

From today's unmissable column:

There was a lot of bird watching in the North East of England last week... and it had nothing to do with Jordan's book-signing in Newcastle.

Which needs to be followed by this.