Day 17 28DW (Yes I’m still going with this 28DW- I will finish!) Tabloid Newspapers



The British newspapers sicken me, not every single one but around 90%. Other countries around the world look at our papers and marvel at the choice due to the freedom of the press. Having variety doesn’t mean the news is quality.

Recently the Leveson enquiry took place that made a list of recommendations to the government about the national newspapers and what is wrong with them. Here is a list of the recommendations.

Summarising this, some of the papers were found to be sexist, racist and homophobic, which anyone who has enough common sense and not a Tory can see, spreading hatred and prejudices. I often wonder who buy these papers because if you want real up to date news you would look on twitter or go online, which means whatever is printed is already out of date. But clearly some people do otherwise they still wouldn’t be around!

Only in the UK could you get newspapers that anyone can buy with women topless or posing in a manner of positions and it be considered ok? The Sun. Sarah 19 from Kent wants to ‘change the world’, so why get your breasts out enforcing that belief to the men who look at it, that it’s ok to objectify women and you know what? You can go up to a woman in the street or on a night out and ogle at her breasts and it’s ok to grab her instead, (I’ve seen it happen). It’s not just the picture that is wrong; it’s the way the stories are written in that paper plus others about how they view women which reinforces the objectifying and bad treatment of women more.

We can’t rule out the Daily Express and Daily Mail either. They objectify the middle class woman instead, the woman they photograph are clothed, but once more it’s the style at which they write which instead of a thick shit reading it, it is a 40-50 year old Tory supporter reading it grabbing his man hood instead.  It’s more subtle but it’s still there. With these papers we have headlines about:

  • Benefit scrounging Britain
  • Number of immigrant’s
  • Lack of jobs for the white British person

The underlying racial hatred is disgusting; I don’t know how the editors of either paper haven’t been charged with spreading racial hatred. All of their stories aren’t based on facts; it’s all scare mongering, reinforcing the people who read these papers of their prejudices and justifying them.

After my previous blog post about the Girls Aloud concert I reviewed, I was on a train home from London on the Monday night to discover that in the Evening Standard an article written by a man named Andre (forgot his surname because believe me if I could find this tosser on twitter and give him a piece of my mind, I would), had been at the same concert as me. His review was written in a very different style, detailing the girls in skimpy outfits, not much dancing and had written it from a perspective that he was in a strip club and the girls were there to dance provocatively for him. Well the girls did do their set dance routines, they did sing live and they put on a fabulous show that got all the audience involved. At no point did they insinuate or simulate sex, any man in attendance getting a hard on must have been a sexual pest and should have been removed (he would have been the only straight guy there). Again he had written it from a chauvinistic point of view objectifying women- shame on you Andre You Cunt!

I was lucky enough to be a performer in the Opening Ceremony of the Olympics (one of the 1000 drummers in the Industrial Revolution), we got into rehearsal one evening in the stadium to discover that the Evening Standard had gone over in a blimp the earlier in the day, taking photos of a set that was half dressed (mid way through a change as they were testing things), with a full write up of assumptions which they listed to their readers as factual, which were incorrect and sending a message out that the ceremony was going to be a disaster and Danny Boyle had no idea what he was doing. Again utter bollocks, factually incorrect and putting the doom and gloom into Londoners that it is all shit. For anyone who watched it, you know how amazing and thought provoking it was.

The person behind a large proportion of the British press? That’s right it’s that all loving Australian that seems to dodge any form of prosecution as he never knew- Rupert Murdoch, worst bit is he isn’t even British so god knows why he is allowed to own a chunk of these papers and control the way in which the British public view the world.

One of my points to this piece, is when you have an individual who controls a large portion of the British press as well as a section of broadcasting (note I do not have Sky and I never will for that reason), there isn’t much freedom of the press as it’s all controlled and from the same source. What infuriates me more is that the recommendations from the Levison enquiry have been swept under the carpet by the government and the reason for this? The papers ultimately help the government win elections, they all have a biased in some form to a party and a few MP’s are in bed with papers which is why allowances are given. Very corrupt and no real freedom of the press! The only people that benefits are the MP’s – selfish!

My second point of the British press is that they influence their readers on a load of bull shit; everything is reported inaccurately. They write in such a negative style, creating prejudices and hatred towards women, homosexuals, ethnic minorities, non Christians, disabled people and anyone who is suffering day to day in angst.

Third point is the offending papers mentioned and a few more have writers/ journalists that often have no knowledge of the subject they are reporting giving an ill informed account. You only need to look at the Sunday Express and Sunday People’s headline today to see this.

I mean who writes about an alcoholic ex footballer who beat up his former wife and screwed up his family in such a rose tinted view, as looking tanned and radiant as they leave a rehab hospital. Um the yellow tan is because his liver is failing and this isn’t real news… That’s right, The Sunday People do.

The Sunday Express ran with a headline ‘Revenge of Saville Victim’ making a mockery of sexual abuse a woman has endured as a child.

If anyone who is reading this and buys any of these papers or goes onto their websites, please don’t. If you want real news, look at The Guardian, The Independent, I or