Tuesday 2 December 2008

Really unpleasant story.

With the Sun having been whipping up hate for the best part of three weeks now over Baby P, it's hardly surprising that those involved have been receiving death threats. Reports the Guardian:

"A threat, warning that her daughter would be killed, was sent to Shoesmith's home address in London. The typrewritten letter, containing a photo of Shoesmith taken from the Sun, with the words "a Christmas box - your daughter will be in" attached, is one of many items of hate mail she has received. As a result, the police have reinforced her doors and windows and offered her protection. Her daughters, both grown up, live in London."

As only the finest press in the world would, they've also been harassing her relatives:

"At the end of the trial, Shoesmith's mother was traced to her home and told her daughter had been involved in the death of a child. She phoned Shoesmith in a distressed state, unaware of what the reporters were talking about."

"Her former mother-in-law was also upset when it was reported in a number of papers that Shoesmith's in-laws found her "ice-cold" and wanted her to resign. One report said: "A woman, who asked to remain anonymous but spoke for the family, said: 'She should have done the decent thing by now'." Shoesmith has received emails entitled 100 Ways to Commit Suicide and ecards with pictures of Baby P containing messages such as "forever on your conscience"."


The Sun naturally carried one of those reports. And despite everything, it's still saying that yesterday's resignations and the sacking of Shoesmith are not enough. Indeed, the leader says that if there are any pay-offs to those involved, they would be blood money. The paper presumably won't be satisfied until there is blood on its own hands.

2 comments:

Daniel Hoffmann-Gill said...

Everything in The Sun is really unpleasant.

Just becuase some people are thick doesn't mean you have to pander to them.

Seriously though, who can make the moral leap to threatening to kill someone, when the problem in the first place was someone killing someone?

Apart for America...

Sonofajoiner said...

'And despite everything, it's still saying that yesterday's resignations and the sacking of Shoesmith are not enough.'

That's what's starting to bother me more and more about tabloid coverage of crime stories, emotive or otherwise. What exactly would be enough punishment? Are people really,in all seriousness, actually agitating for violence against the social workers involved? I mean, the major requirement of the sun's moron magnet, or e-petition as I believe they're calling it, is that Shoesmith et al be fired. That's been done. So what now? A spell in the stocks? Lock em up in the tower? The literal sacrifice of their first-borns?