Mail: a truly despicable article ("nothing 'natural' about Stephen Gately's death")
- Thread starter Badger Kitten
- Start date
5t3IIa
Registered User
trashpony
Hag
claphamboy
The wheels on the bus go round and round....
Right I am going to mount my own protest tomorrow, buy my usual ticket, but walk into town.
claphamboy
The wheels on the bus go round and round....
.
Frankie Jack
Not a bloke..
From what I gather.. the printed version has the "sad and lonely death" header.. while the online version had the " Nothing natural " heading...
It was the online version that was changed... I could be wrong tho... but I'm sure I've seen that explanation in one of the links from other sites and newsagencies..
It was the online version that was changed... I could be wrong tho... but I'm sure I've seen that explanation in one of the links from other sites and newsagencies..
I'm starting to flag a bit and may crash out and come back later.
I just wanted to tell you that I sent a hand written letter to Paul Dacre (fountain pen, expensive paper and envelope. My handwriting is really good and an assistant would treat the envelope with care) recorded snail mail complaint to Dacre.
Wonder if it will be acknowledged.
Oh, and being a pedant, I complained about the incorrect use of 'decorous'
I just wanted to tell you that I sent a hand written letter to Paul Dacre (fountain pen, expensive paper and envelope. My handwriting is really good and an assistant would treat the envelope with care) recorded snail mail complaint to Dacre.
Wonder if it will be acknowledged.
Oh, and being a pedant, I complained about the incorrect use of 'decorous'
ivebeenhigh
Well-Known Member
Cunting thing - I can't work out how to incite the group members
Has it appeared in your feed?
heh
quimcunx
imprimeo, lamino, distribuo
Cunting thing - I can't work out how to incite the group members
Has it appeared in your feed?
Your thank you message took hours to get to me on facebook so be patient, young grasshopper.
someone way earlier in the thread said something about the scottish version being different, but not, that I remember, mentioning the english print version....
5t3IIa
Registered User
Frankie Jack
Not a bloke..
From what I've heard from Scottish mail readers.. this is true.. Cannot confirm tho...
colacubes
Mr Hot Cookie
Badger Kitten
oof
5t3IIa
Registered User
5t3IIa
Registered User
Blimey http://www.votemoir.com/
Strumpet
gypsy girl
claphamboy
The wheels on the bus go round and round....
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
Badger Kitten
oof
Dear Mr Dacre
I am writing to express my disgust at the horrible, bigoted, insensitive column which your paper published by Jan Moir on Friday 16th.
The timing was spectacularly cruel and intrusive , as the family, friends, mourners and fans of Mr Gately prepared for his funeral the following day. There was no distinguishing between conjecture, comment and facts - the title 'There was nothing 'natural' about Stephen Gately's death' is a clear breach of the PCC code to maintain standards of accuracy. Moir's opening salvo - that if a celebrity died young, it was more than likely due to 'a life that is shadowed by dark appetites or fractured by private vice' is particularly ludicrous, given that Gately died of natural causes. It was tasteless in the extreme to speculate inaccurately on the manner of a young man's tragic passing, in the process blithely ignoring the coroner's findings and inferring his grieving mother was a liar or covering up secret, 'sordid, sleazy' facts - again, this is a clear breach of the PCC Code, as you must know.
The arguments put forward by Moir were sloppy to the point of incoherence and the standards of journalism and sub-editing particularly poor (Moir used 'decorous' when she clearly meant 'decorative', for example). The inaccuracies continued. Moir claimed 'Healthy and fit 33-year-old men do not just climb into their pyjamas and go to sleep on the sofa, never to wake up again.Yes they do - as a moment's research would have told her; such is the tragedy of Sudden Adult Death syndrome, where young people, previously healthy suddently pass away, frequently due to an undiagnosed heart condition.
There is no 'myth' that all civil partnerships end in 'happy ever after', just as there is no myth that any marriage or indeed any other legal contract between people ends similarly, so this was a pointless 'straw man'. There was a clear intent to make a link between the suicide of one gay man who was addicted to drugs and had been in a civil partnership, and the untimely death due to natural causes of Mr Gately, who died of a pulmonary oedema. The implication - clear implication, not an 'undertone' - was that gay partnerships, enshrined in law, were likely to end badly, probably in death - Moir says raises 'troubling questions' to consider that two men in civil partnerships had died young - no, it doesn't, unless you are a bigot or homophobe or unable to apply logical reasoning, preferring to indulge in conspiracy theories and wild speculation. The columnist also speculated that the presence of a third party in the flat contributed to the death in some way. Of course it didn't, any more than the presence of children sleeping or playing in a different room contributed to the death in her sleep of my friend's sister, who, like Mr Gately, went to sleep and never woke up, due to pulmonary oedema.
'For once again, under the carapace of glittering, hedonistic celebrity, the ooze of a very different and more dangerous lifestyle has seeped out for all to see', writes Moir. But the plain fact is that pulmonary oedema can kill whether you have spent the waking day arranging flowers at church, doing a sponsored swim for charity or cooking a meal for your young family. There is no other conclusion to draw from the dog-whistle language used by Moir - 'rented cottage' - 'sleazy' -'sordid' - 'myth of civil partnerships' - 'unnatural' - 'ooze' - and so on - other than that the writer holds bigoted and intolerant, and woefully inaccurate views about gay men and gay lifestyles that are homophobic, and entirely out of step with what tolerant, decent people believe.
By publishing such a foul article, you have badly misjudged your audience and upset your advertisers. Janet Street Porter's commendable column is not enough to repair the damage. 22,000 complaints to the PCC should be an indicator. Moir's response to the furore - to claim that she was a victim of a 'mischievous' 'orchestrated campaign', that few complainers had even read her column and to infer that only gay people were upset further confirms her bigotry and ignorance of British life today - has she no idea how social media works? No understanding of how out of step her views are, how offensive they are? The world has changed and if she cannot keep up, she should find a different job to the one she has.
It is not possible to 'orchestrate' a viral reaction of such speed and fury, and across so many different demographics. The 22% increase in traffic to her page on your site gives the lie to the idea that few read what she wrote, for heaven's sake. And a quick browse of the profiles of the 29,000 plus facebook group members calling for the article to be retracted will show you that they comprise both men and women, straight and gay - mostly ABC1 and female in fact, the very target audience of the Mail. They are clear that they will never purchase the paper again, and many are busy writing to your advertisers even now to ask them not to support a paper that disseminates such prurient anti-gay inaccurate and cruel opinions.
The PCC makes it clear what you should do: honour the code's spirit and letter, retract, correct and apologise with due prominence.
I look forward to your reply.
Regards
Badger Kitten (Mrs)
I am writing to express my disgust at the horrible, bigoted, insensitive column which your paper published by Jan Moir on Friday 16th.
The timing was spectacularly cruel and intrusive , as the family, friends, mourners and fans of Mr Gately prepared for his funeral the following day. There was no distinguishing between conjecture, comment and facts - the title 'There was nothing 'natural' about Stephen Gately's death' is a clear breach of the PCC code to maintain standards of accuracy. Moir's opening salvo - that if a celebrity died young, it was more than likely due to 'a life that is shadowed by dark appetites or fractured by private vice' is particularly ludicrous, given that Gately died of natural causes. It was tasteless in the extreme to speculate inaccurately on the manner of a young man's tragic passing, in the process blithely ignoring the coroner's findings and inferring his grieving mother was a liar or covering up secret, 'sordid, sleazy' facts - again, this is a clear breach of the PCC Code, as you must know.
The arguments put forward by Moir were sloppy to the point of incoherence and the standards of journalism and sub-editing particularly poor (Moir used 'decorous' when she clearly meant 'decorative', for example). The inaccuracies continued. Moir claimed 'Healthy and fit 33-year-old men do not just climb into their pyjamas and go to sleep on the sofa, never to wake up again.Yes they do - as a moment's research would have told her; such is the tragedy of Sudden Adult Death syndrome, where young people, previously healthy suddently pass away, frequently due to an undiagnosed heart condition.
There is no 'myth' that all civil partnerships end in 'happy ever after', just as there is no myth that any marriage or indeed any other legal contract between people ends similarly, so this was a pointless 'straw man'. There was a clear intent to make a link between the suicide of one gay man who was addicted to drugs and had been in a civil partnership, and the untimely death due to natural causes of Mr Gately, who died of a pulmonary oedema. The implication - clear implication, not an 'undertone' - was that gay partnerships, enshrined in law, were likely to end badly, probably in death - Moir says raises 'troubling questions' to consider that two men in civil partnerships had died young - no, it doesn't, unless you are a bigot or homophobe or unable to apply logical reasoning, preferring to indulge in conspiracy theories and wild speculation. The columnist also speculated that the presence of a third party in the flat contributed to the death in some way. Of course it didn't, any more than the presence of children sleeping or playing in a different room contributed to the death in her sleep of my friend's sister, who, like Mr Gately, went to sleep and never woke up, due to pulmonary oedema.
'For once again, under the carapace of glittering, hedonistic celebrity, the ooze of a very different and more dangerous lifestyle has seeped out for all to see', writes Moir. But the plain fact is that pulmonary oedema can kill whether you have spent the waking day arranging flowers at church, doing a sponsored swim for charity or cooking a meal for your young family. There is no other conclusion to draw from the dog-whistle language used by Moir - 'rented cottage' - 'sleazy' -'sordid' - 'myth of civil partnerships' - 'unnatural' - 'ooze' - and so on - other than that the writer holds bigoted and intolerant, and woefully inaccurate views about gay men and gay lifestyles that are homophobic, and entirely out of step with what tolerant, decent people believe.
By publishing such a foul article, you have badly misjudged your audience and upset your advertisers. Janet Street Porter's commendable column is not enough to repair the damage. 22,000 complaints to the PCC should be an indicator. Moir's response to the furore - to claim that she was a victim of a 'mischievous' 'orchestrated campaign', that few complainers had even read her column and to infer that only gay people were upset further confirms her bigotry and ignorance of British life today - has she no idea how social media works? No understanding of how out of step her views are, how offensive they are? The world has changed and if she cannot keep up, she should find a different job to the one she has.
It is not possible to 'orchestrate' a viral reaction of such speed and fury, and across so many different demographics. The 22% increase in traffic to her page on your site gives the lie to the idea that few read what she wrote, for heaven's sake. And a quick browse of the profiles of the 29,000 plus facebook group members calling for the article to be retracted will show you that they comprise both men and women, straight and gay - mostly ABC1 and female in fact, the very target audience of the Mail. They are clear that they will never purchase the paper again, and many are busy writing to your advertisers even now to ask them not to support a paper that disseminates such prurient anti-gay inaccurate and cruel opinions.
The PCC makes it clear what you should do: honour the code's spirit and letter, retract, correct and apologise with due prominence.
I look forward to your reply.
Regards
Badger Kitten (Mrs)
claphamboy
The wheels on the bus go round and round....
Even the Mail's Irish title isn't happy.....
Irish Daily Mail disowns Jan Moir
_____
This comment made me lol. .......
Was Jan Moir Twitter outcry 'orchestrated'?
Irish Daily Mail disowns Jan Moir
_____
This comment made me lol.
.......Was Jan Moir Twitter outcry 'orchestrated'?
5t3IIa
Registered User
Even the Mail's Irish title isn't happy.....
Irish Daily Mail disowns Jan Moir
_____
This comment made me lol.
Was Jan Moir Twitter outcry 'orchestrated'?
http://wthashtag.com/transcript.php...&end_date=2009-10-18&tz=2:00&export_type=HTML
That's interesting but how are there tweets about Charlie's Brookers article when it was pubbed way after 11am? Are the times off?
Badger Kitten
oof
He tweeted about it before he published on the Guardian
5t3IIa
Registered User
Jonny Harmsworth, Lord Rothermere's pile co-ordinates
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en...99999,-2.09767&spn=0.005131,0.009624&t=h&z=17
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en...99999,-2.09767&spn=0.005131,0.009624&t=h&z=17
Kanda
Diving wanker
I thought Brookers article was put up in the evening?
sleaterkinney
Well-Known Member
I wouldn't bother writing to Dacre btw, he's probably loving the attention.
5t3IIa
Registered User
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