Batman casting is a riddle to the Sun

The Dark Knight Rises opens in cinemas today.

Some Sun readers may be slightly confused, however, by seeing Anne Hathaway playing Catwoman.

Why? Because the Sun's Gordon Smart 'revealed' in January 2011 that Megan Fox had 'signed up to play Catwoman':

Moreover, in a 'world exclusive' in December 2008 (in which they also noted Rachel Weisz was 'up for' Catwoman), Smart and Jess Rogers also 'revealed':

The story says:

FUNNYMAN EDDIE MURPHY will play The Riddler in the next Batman movie, The Sun can reveal.

The Beverly Hills Cop star, 47, has been signed up by British director CHRISTOPHER NOLAN...

A film insider said...“Eddie’s a fantastic addition. Everyone’s excited to see what he does as the Riddler.”

'Everyone' will have to wait...

The appalling irresponsibility of EastEnders.

You may well have to forgive me for thinking there's something ever so slightly redundant about complaining over the sensationalist and unrealistic nature of soap opera storylines (especially considering a good part of this blog is regularly given over to doing something similar when it comes to tabloid newspapers, and indeed as this post is also going to). It's rather like whining about quiz shows for containing questions, moaning that Noel Edmonds pretends there's something more than pure luck to Deal or No Deal or being surprised when Live at the Apollo isn't funny.

It therefore doesn't really strike me as especially beyond the pale, insensitive or going too far for EastEnders to have a character's baby die of cot death and in a moment of grief stricken madness for her to swap it with a friend's perfectly healthy child. If anything, it seems in remarkably good taste compared to Emmerdale's infamous plane crash storyline, coming as it did close to the fifth anniversary of the Lockerbie bombing, and certainly no less plausible than Coronation Street marking its 50th anniversary with the the celebratory plot of a gas explosion causing a tram crash. This is to say nothing of Neighbours having characters apparently return from the grave, or Crossroads finish its short-lived revival with the revelation that the entire series had been the dream of a supermarket checkout assistant. It's true that EastEnders has unlike the other soaps somewhat tried in the past to deliver hard-hitting plotlines while giving over time to the social issues behind them, and tried to at least keep the notion of realism involved, even if not narrative realism as Claude argues, and this latest development goes somewhat against that, yet it still doesn't seem any more outlandish or offensive than the burying alive of Max Branning, which Ofcom decided was inappropriately shown before the watershed.

Where it starts to get even more ridiculous is when newspapers use editorial space* to attack broadcasters as a whole for even considering using such "warped sensationalism" as "entertainment". Already in the past year we've seen the Sun condemn the BBC for the perceived anti-Conservative bias of Basil Brush; now the paper has taken up the complaints of Anne Diamond and the apparently permanently indignant whingers at Mumsnet by calling the EastEnders storyline an "appalling misjudgement" when it could have tackled the subject "responsibly". Whether the paper was always going to strike out at the corporation over the subject regardless of being leaked the news that the actor portraying the character who lost her baby is leaving the show is impossible to know, but it hardly helps the paper's credibility that despite claiming she was leaving as a direct result of the storyline, her agent has since made clear that in fact the decision had been made months ago. Not such a "huge embarrassment" to the corporation then as the paper's editorial had so confidently stated.

The Sun taking almost any opportunity to criticise the BBC is hardly a new development. It does though really start to enter into the realms of abject hypocrisy when only last week the paper had to apologise for claiming that there was a specific al-Qaida threat against the filming of Coronation Street's live episode, despite Greater Manchester police making clear at the time that they were only involved in policing the perimeter of the set at the request of Granada, with the officers involved being paid by the production company for the time spent away from their normal duties. If anything smacks of warped sensationalism, such a ridiculous and potentially damaging story does; it hardly comes across as responsible either. While the paper had no problems finding the space to feature criticism of the BBC, it strangely didn't mention the controversy featured in other papers concerning Frankie Boyle's Tramadol Nights on Channel 4, something which doubtless has absolutely nothing to do with the man himself penning a column for none other than Sun rather than the paper deciding that it was a non-story.

Still, now that the storylines of fictional dramas are considered to be worthy of comment in the leader column of the paper's biggest selling newspaper, we can no doubt rely on the fact that the Sun will be giving the plots of the programmes on the new Sky Atlantic a similarly critical once over. It would certainly make a change to the company being plugged endlessly in every other section.

*As the Sun's editorials are not properly archived on the paper's website, the leader column in full can be read below:

COT death is a nightmare that haunts every parent of a new baby.

So who at the BBC imagined sensationalising such a heartbreaking theme would make good "entertainment"?

We are used to EastEnders being grim. It was no surprise that a particularly depressing episode was lined up for New Year's Eve.

But this time, the level of outrage proves the show went too far.

Actress Samantha Womack did her best to play tragic mum Ronnie Branning with sensitivity as she switched her dead baby for the infant son of Kat and Alfie Moon.

But, as The Sun reveals, Samantha was so distressed by the storyline she handed in her notice after seeing the script and will leave in May.

The actress made it clear she thought the plot was a mistake and would cause a backlash. But bosses ignored her.

Her resignation is a huge embarrassment to the BBC.

As broadcaster Anne Diamond, who lost her baby son to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, said, not even cot death was dramatic enough for EastEnders. It had to go one better with the ludicrous baby swap.

Campaigners like Anne have helped reduce the cot death toll from 2,000 a year to 300.

EastEnders could have helped that campaign by tackling the subject responsibly.

Reducing it to warped sensationalism was an appalling misjudgment.

Do Sun journalists tell lies?

Does the left hand know what the right hand's doing at the Sun? You have to ask based on today's incredibly familiar editorial attacking the same old "Leftie union dinosaurs" it's been fulminating against for over 20 years:

UNION brothers nibble mince pies at No10 with David Cameron.

Advertisement

The PM wants to defuse tensions over spending cuts. Asking the TUC round was a friendly, constructive step.

But some union barons are hell bent on trouble. Rabid Leftie Len McCluskey, new boss of Unite, calls for war against the Government.

He orders union members to "prepare for battle" and praises "magnificent" student demonstrators who brought mayhem to London.

The Sun does not believe sensible Unite members want sickening violence and vandalism of the sort we have recently seen.

Will Labour's Red Ed Miliband personally slap down Unite's Red Len McCluskey?

Do turkeys vote for Christmas?

If the leader writer had bothered to read the paper's own article on the meeting, they would have already known the answer:

Labour leader Ed Miliband has already distanced himself from Mr McCluskey's "battle" remarks.

And if that doesn't count as "personally slapping down" McCluskey, then the actual statement from Miliband's spokesman should make clear that was exactly what he intends to do:

Ed warned about using overblown rhetoric about strikes in his conference speech and this is a case in point. The language and tone of Len McCluskey’s comments are wrong and unhelpful and Ed Miliband will be making that clear when he meets him in the near future.

Still, why bother with small things like accurately representing the leader of the Labour party when portraying him as a cartoon character is so much more amusing?

The Sun's investigations into suicide chat groups.

There's a couple of posts over on my place concerning the Sun's coverage of the suicide pact between Joanne Lee and Steve Lumb. We thought it best not to reproduce them here due to the potentially distressing and sensitive nature of the material covered.

Fizz Royal Highness falls flat.

(Major hat-tip to Tabloid Watch on this.)

It's always amusing when such a banal front page falls apart within the space of an entire day, as happened to yesterday's super splash claiming that Prince Harry had spent £10,000 on champagne in just 4 hours. There really isn't any excuse for it, either: St James' Palace is always fairly open with the press, but they balance this with being very quick to correct inaccuracies, as they have in this case:

"Prince Harry spent approximately an hour and-a-half at the nightclub, where he enjoyed a bottle of beer and a glass of champagne. Prince Harry did not buy anyone else any drinks.

"A friend of Prince Harry hosted the entire evening. It is not true to suggest that Prince Harry spent large sums of money at the club. The £10,000 figure is nonsense."

In other words, if Harry did provide others in the nightclub with drinks, or were at least under the impression that he had, they were most likely being paid for by his friend and not by him.

The Sun has attempted to cover this in the usual fashion: by making up quotes from "friends":

But one chum close to the Prince said: "Harry is very much the the (sic) life and soul of the party so it's easy for people to think that he's getting the drinks in - especially after they have had a few themselves.

"Harry had a good time - but clearly it wasn't as lively as that of the group he met. He's saving the partying for once he passes his training."

Still, not a bad way to follow-up a completely inaccurate front page story - by dumping the "clarification" back on page 19.

Adjudication over "Boy, 12, turns into girl" report.

The Press Complaints Commission upheld the complaints under clauses 1 and 3 of the code, but rejected further breaches of 3, 4, 6 and 12:

A married couple complained to the Press Complaints Commission through the charity Mermaids that two articles headlined "Boy, 12, turns into girl" and "Now boy, 9, is girl", published in The Sun on 18 September 2009 and 19 September 2009 respectively, contained inaccuracies in breach of Clause 1 (Accuracy) and intruded into their daughter's private life in breach of Clause 3 (Privacy) of the Editors' Code of Practice.

The complaint was upheld.

Separate complaints under Clauses 3 (Privacy), 4 (Harassment), 6 (Children) and 12 (Discrimination) were not upheld. A further complaint from a second couple through Mermaids was also not upheld.

The complainants' child was born as a boy but had begun to behave as a girl from an early age. At 8, her parents allowed her to live as a girl at home. She then moved from primary to secondary school and her name was changed. Following incidents of teasing, the secondary school held a meeting with other children to explain her new situation. After this, some parents of the children had discussed the matter online and threats had been made against the family. The 18 September article reported the story - without naming the family - and a further article appeared the next day.

The complainants said that the article was inaccurate when it stated that their daughter was "preparing for sex swap surgery". There were other inaccuracies in the piece in regard to: the child's uniform; what she wore for swimming lessons; her hairstyle and accessories; the colour of her micro-scooter; and the provision of toilet facilities in both schools. These points gave a misleading impression of the child. The complainants also said that the newspaper had passed on their contact details without consent to a TV production company, which then wrote requesting an interview.

The newspaper said that the child now looked, acted and wished to be treated as a girl and was in that sense "preparing" for surgery. The other points did not appear to be significant, but it offered to publish a correction and apology on them. The newspaper accepted that it had passed on the complainants' details to the TV production company. The subsequent approach had been made by letter only and no interview had taken place.

Decision:
Upheld

Adjudication:

Adjudication

The Commission agreed that the cumulative effect of the inaccuracies served to give a misleading impression of the girl's appearance and behaviour at the school. This was unacceptable and the newspaper should have taken greater care when publishing details of such a vulnerable child. This raised a breach of Clause 1 of the Code.

In addition, the newspaper had passed on the family's details to a third party - therefore identifying the child - at a time when it had been specifically informed that further contact from the media was unwelcome. Given that the newspaper had recognised the need to avoid naming the child publicly, the decision to identify her to a third party (who would not otherwise have known who she was) was clearly an error. The paper had shown a failure to respect her private and family life in breach of Clause 3 of the Code.

The Sun really can't seem to get its facts straight when it reports on children - first the Alfie Patten fiasco, which the paper got nowhere near the amount of criticism it should have had for claiming that he'd fathered a child when he had not - now this, getting almost every factual detail about the girl's life at school completely wrong. It would be interesting to know who this third party was that the Sun released the name of the child to, just to see whether there was potential collusion between broadcasters owned or co-owned by the same parent company as the Sun, but that's a detail stricken from the record. Naming and shaming it seems is all right for paedophiles and criminals, but not newspapers that breach the PCC's code.

The punishment for these serious breaches of the code? Err, no apology whatsoever it seems, just the publishing of the adjudication as is always required. Would be interesting to know on what page it features, especially considering as if I remember correctly both of these reports featured on the front page of the paper. Is it any wonder that so many turn to our learned friends for recompense when the PCC's rulings are so pathetically weak?

Off their Nutts.

Back in November the Sun decided that it was time to resort to the old tabloid trick of attacking someone by association when they couldn't lay a finger on the target himself personally. David Nutt, a senior adviser on drugs to the ACMD, had just been defenestrated by Alan Johnson for daring to argue again that cannabis isn't as dangerous as either the government claims or its classification suggests, so naturally it was time to go scouting around his children's social networking pages to see if they could find any pay dirt.

The result, an article which accused his son Stephen of partaking in cannabis because he was smoking what was clearly a roll-up and not a normal, honest, cigarette, his daughter Lydia of drinking underage, and the by no means hypocritical sneering at his eldest son for appearing naked in the snow in Sweden, ended up being removed with days of it appearing.

Yesterday the Press Complaints Commission published Stephen Nutt's letter of complaint on their website (h/t Tabloid Watch):

The complaint was resolved when the newspaper removed the article from the website, undertook not to repeat the story and published the following letter:

FURTHER to your article about photographs of me on my Facebook site, (November 14) I would like to make clear the pictures were not posted by me and while I had been drinking I was smoking a rolled-up cigarette which did not contain cannabis as the article insinuated. My younger sister Lydia was not intoxicated, so was not drinking under age. My older brother lives in Sweden where it is custom to use a sauna followed by a ‘romp' in the snow in winter. He was neither drunk nor under the influence of intoxicants. Innocuous photographs were taken out of context in an attempt to discredit my father's work.

Which is about as comprehensive and wounding a clarification as ever gets published in the Sun. The article was so obviously in breach of the PCC's code on privacy, not to mention accuracy, that it should never have been published in the first place though; why then should the paper get away without making anything approaching an apology, only having to print a clarification buried away on the letters page? As long as the PCC remains so toothless in the face of such egregious breaches of its code, the campaigning will continue not just for reform but potentially for independent regulation of the press.

Thatcher, sick pics, some contempt and 40 years as the Eye sees it.

Wednesday. The easiest day of the fortnight for the Media Watch editor of this place.

This fortnight, after a bit of a drought recently, Private Eye has served up a couple of juicey bits.

First of all shocking pictures...



This being the story in question.

The next is an example of the Sun showing contempt for the Contempt of Court Act 1981...



...with a nice little dig at the Met Commissioner, too.

PE couldn't let 40 years of the sun go by without it's own little corner, either...



That last headline is a cracker, isn't it? There was an apology, in the only place it should've been for headline as wrong in every way as 'Straight sex cannot give you AIDS - Official': page 28. /sarcasm

Adam Macqueen, in 2006, writes about a similarly scarey, and dangerous, headline "Killer Plagues", about AIDS & HIV riddled Bulgarians and Hungarians invading Britian.

And to finish with, something a little lighter...

Yet more lies about "evil terrorists".

Last week the Sun had to apologise to Abdul Muneem Patel for calling him an "evil terrorist" and claiming that he had been involved in the liquid explosives plot. He had in fact been found guilty of having a document which could be useful to terrorists, which the judge accepted he had unknowingly kept for a friend of his father's. The judge also stated specifically that Patel was not a radicalised or politicised Islamist, but this didn't stop the Sun from telling Patel's neighbours a pack of lies about his supposed secret terrorist past.

As could have been expected, the Sun has learnt absolutely nothing from having to print such a humiliating apology. You might have thought they might have waited a little longer though to repeat almost exactly the same exercise, but obviously not. This time the paper is outraged that

THREE convicted terrorists who plotted to kidnap and behead a British Muslim soldier have been freed early from jail.

Hamid Elasmar, 46, Zahoor Iqbal, 32, and Mohammed Irfan, 33, were all caged less than two years ago.

Except these three weren't convicted of plotting to kidnap and behead a British Muslim soldier, as a few minutes of fact checking would have made clear. All three were in fact involved with the plot's ringleader, Parviz Khan, but in smuggling equipment to fighters in Pakistan. The prosecutors accepted that Iqbal and Irfan had nothing to do with the beheading plot, while Elasmar's house was used for discussing the plot, although whether Elasmar was there at the time or not is unclear; considering he received the most lenient sentence of the three one would suspect he wasn't. The Sun also has it completely wrong on Khan supposedly telling Elasmar that "we'll cut it off like you cut a pig"; Khan was in fact talking to Basiru Gassama, already released and presumably deported.

The Sun being the Sun, it couldn't just leave it at that. No, it had to include a leader comment on its completely wrong article:

HOW is it possible that three terrorists who planned to behead a squaddie have been freed within two years?

Err, because they didn't plan to behead a squaddie?

Simple: They all behaved themselves in prison.

Oh, right, that must be it.

The breathtaking evil of the crime they plotted counted for nothing.

Or it counted for nothing because they weren't involved in the "breathtaking evil" of the crime?

Good behaviour sprung them early from already derisory sentences. One was released in only five months, to a life on housing benefits.

Our justice system is a laughing stock.

Only the Sun could call a sentence of seven years "derisory", which is what Iqbal received. It might be derisory if Iqbal had been convicted of plotting to beheading a soldier, but he wasn't. The real laughing stock here should be a so called newspaper that either can't or won't do the very basics of actual journalism, checking facts. Anyone up for complaining to the Press Complaints Commission?

The misleading has begun already.

Splashed across yesterday's Sun front page were those ordinary voters who like the paper had decided that Labour's lost it. Alongside those who would blame the government if it rains was one Ros Altmann, a former adviser to Tony Blair and now a governor at the LSE. The Sun's report of her comments was thus:

I thought we had a chance to make a difference. But Brown wanted people to spend, spend, spend and thought that will generate growth.

That is not the way economics work. We needed radical change. But we got radical complications. We have the world's lowest state pension, but also the most complex. I am hopeful for David Cameron. I don't think he can make a worse mess of pensions. I can see why The Sun supports him.

Not exactly a ringing endorsement of the Tories, but Hugh Muir in the Grauniad Diary has more:

For sure, the economist has strong criticism of the pensions and economics polices pursued by Gordon. But there it ends. "What I said to them in answer to the specific question: 'Do I now support the Tories?' was 'No'," she tells us. "I said I don't know what their policies are so I can't support them. I said I can understand that some people no longer support Labour. There has been a bit of poetic licence here." Such is war.

And as could have been predicted, David Cameron today gives the paper an interview, unveiling 10 pledges, all naturally Sun-pleasing and many also naturally counter-productive or just wrong-headed. Reassessing every person on incapacity benefit? Stupidly wasteful in both time and cost terms. Replacing the Human Rights Act with a piss-poor "British" bill of rights substitute when the Tories almost certainly won't withdraw from the European Convention of Human Rights will just delay justice. And as for reforming inheritance tax to "encourage saving", words fail me. One new one, although not included on the 10 pledges itself, is that Cameron will institute a "war cabinet" on Afghanistan should the Tories come to power, something demanded by the Sun only a few weeks back. It doesn't seem to matter that such a cabinet would be pointless when it's the military and not the politicians who are helming the fighting, but then the Sun has always loved symbolism far more than well thought out and implementable strategy.

Repeated corrections.

The Sun, probably due to Dominic Mohan taking over as editor, seems to be going through one of its periodical fits of declaring that everything wrong with everything is either the fault of political correctness and/or health and safety. Hence today it's time to turn on those bastards in the public services that look after their own safety first rather than those they're called out to help. I can't comment on the first three examples the paper highlights in its editorial, but it really should have known better than to use the tragic death of Jordon Lyons as a stick to beat police community support officers with:

Two police support officers just stood watching as a 10-year-old boy drowned, claiming they didn't have the correct training.

The Sun had to correct their original report after Greater Manchester Police complained to the PCC:

Mr David Whatton, Assistant Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police, complained that the newspaper inaccurately suggested that Police Community Support Officers had stood by while Jordon Lyons drowned and did nothing to help.

Resolution:

The complaint was resolved when the newspaper published the following apology:
“Our reports on the inquest of Jordon Lyon who drowned trying to rescue his sister (September 2007) stated two Police Community Support Officers from Greater Manchester Police stood by and did nothing. We wish to clarify the two PCSOs arrived after Jordon disappeared under water and they summoned help and directed other emergency services to the scene. We apologise for any distress our report may have caused.”

Not only then had the boy likely already drowned when they had arrived, but they summoned further help, with the police themselves arriving within minutes of the support team arriving, far from "doing nothing" or "standing watching", as the Sun puts it today.

I'm sure the PCC will come down on the Sun like a ton of bricks for repeating something it's already had to correct, or err, it'll probably just do naff all as usual.

The Easter Island Wonder Drug

I was going to take apart this article about an alleged "wonder drug" that increases your lifespan by "decades".

However, MacGuffin over at Tabloid Watch, has done a similar thing with the Daily Express's coverage.

As far as I can tell, the only difference in the two papers' coverage is the name of who wrote the article and so I recommend that you go there instead.

The BMI Calculator

I've noticed that the Sun now has a body-mass index calculator (BMI) on its Health & Diet page.

If you're not aware, BMI is used as a guide to whether someone should be classed as overweight, by taking the ratio of their mass to the square of their height.

The problem is that the Sun simply advertises it as follows:

Overweight? See our BMI calculator

It implies that it an absolute measurement, but Wikipedia shows that it isn't what it's designed for:

BMI has become controversial because many people, including physicians, have come to rely on its apparent numerical authority for medical diagnosis, but that was never the BMI's purpose. It is meant to be used as a simple means of classifying sedentary (physically inactive) individuals with an average body composition.

The Sun doesn't bother to say that if, for example, you're a body builder then it would be a waste of time using it (because muscle has a greater mass than fat, which would warp the results), nor does it state that it is simply a guide for an average person. In any event, the Sun doesn't give any explanation as to what BMI does until you type in your details:

For Adults:

Underweight = <18.5
Normal weight = 18.5-24.9
Overweight = 25-29.9
Obesity = BMI of 30 or greater

For children, see BMI charts

For the record, my BMI is 21.6, which is in the middle of the "Average" range.

What is odd is the way the Sun goes about calculating BMI: they ask for your height in feet and inches - no metric option is available - and it asks for your weight in lbs. Does anyone actually weigh themselves in lbs in the UK? I was expecting stones and possibly kg.

While I appreciate the Sun's attempts, it could have done a lot better with a minimal amount of effort.

Alfie Patten: the PCC is shown to be useless yet again.

To get an idea of just how useless the Press Complaints Commission is, you only have to look at its non-investigation into the Alfie Patten disaster. You would have thought that they might just have something to say about how the Sun, the People and the Sunday Mail had almost certainly paid his family for personal interviews which led to some of the most invasive and potentially damaging intrusion into the private lives of children for some years, only for it to subsequently turn out that, oops, Alfie wasn't the father after all.

Today the Commission announced that it is to do, well, nothing. To be fair, that isn't quite what it's done. Because of the restrictions imposed by the High Court, which prevent the families of both Patten and Chantelle Steadman from being approached, the PCC supposedly has been unable to determine exactly what was paid, what was expected in return for that payment, how the families intended to use the money, how concerned the newspapers were about the children's welfare and the circumstances surrounding the original mistaken identification of Alfie as the father. It has instead elaborated on its guidelines on payments to parents for material about their children, which while welcome, is not for a moment going to stop this happening again.

While it's unfortunate that the families themselves cannot tell their side of the story, this is letting the opposite side completely off the hook. Is the PCC a regulator or is it not? A regulator with any teeth would have demanded that the newspapers themselves reveal what was promised, and just how, if the reports of the Sun setting up a trust fund for the child are accurate, it was intending to deliver the payment. It isn't clear that this information was sought at all; instead, it seems the PCC was relying purely on the families to inform them of what deals were made.

What the papers did provide the PCC with, predictably, was their arguments on how it certainly was in the public interest for them to claim that a 13-year-old who looked more like 8 had fathered a child:

The newspapers argued that the articles involved the important issue of the prevalence, and impact, of teenage pregnancy within British society. By identifying the principals involved and presenting them in a particular way, the story dramatised and personalised these issues in a way that stimulated a wide-ranging public debate, involving contributions from senior politicians (which included the Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition). The newspapers said that they were fulfilling an important duty in publicising to a large audience a social problem that is perceived to be widespread. Their position was that the case was, on the evidence available at the time of publication, an exceptional example of the problem.

This is all true. This however doesn't take into account the fact that it was not in either Patten or Steadman's best interests for the entire world to know intimate details about their lives, with their parents making the decision for them based presumably on the fact that there was money offered in exchanged. There was only a story because of how Patten looked; 13-year-olds being fathers is rare, but not that rare. 15-year-olds being fathers and mothers however, is not a story at all, as in this case it subsequently turned out to be. Some might think it should be a story, and that it's a sad reflection on society at large when it isn't, on which they might have something approaching a point, but that isn't the issue here. Most damningly, the newspapers don't seem to have taken any real interest in how their stories would affect the children, and in the case of the People, doesn't seem to have decided that how Patten had to be begged, almost forced to come and speak to them might have suggested that they shouldn't be running such reports.

The Sun especially must be laughing at the weakness of the PCC. To say they profited from the story would be an understatement: almost purely down to the Patten report, which went around the world at the social horror of a baby himself becoming a father, they sky-rocketed to the top of the ABCe tables, becoming the most popular UK newspaper website for Feburary, with over 27 million unique visitors. However much they promised to pay the Patten family, they must have surely more than made their money back. For a newspaper editor who has dedicated herself to campaigning for child protection, either for Sarah's law or for "justice" for Baby P, Rebekah Wade seems to have completely lost her moral compass over Patten, and the only organisation which could have punished her has spurned its opportunity.

Absolutely shameless part 2.

It's a real shame that the revelation that the Sun's story concerning Alfie Patten has been shown to be completely wrong isn't getting the attention it deserves, with the continuing row over MPs expenses overshadowing it, because the account of what actually seems to have happened continues to worsen.

In what seems to be a growing pattern of newspapers promising payments for stories only to later then renege on the details, it now appears that the Sun did not pay Patten's parents any money for the story. Whether this was because they had no intention of doing so, knowing that it would breach the Press Complaints Commission's code if they did is unclear, and it has to be said we are relying on the distinctly unreliable Max Clifford for the allegation that the paper had promised a large sum of money for the story which it then failed to stump up (his claim that he stopped the coverage seems to be erroneous; social services got a court order which definitely did stop it). The Guardian does however confirm that the paper has now promised that it will set-up a trust fund for the child itself, which distinctly suggests that considering that Patten will now presumably have no involvement with the bringing up of the child, no payment is going to be made to either him or his parents.

Clifford, for once, does seem to be on the side of justice in this case. In a previous interview with the Graun, he said that he had started representing the Patten family because of the tabloid mob which was trying to desperately get their own side of the story, trying his best to curb the excesses they were resorting to. Whether if they had gone to him first rather than to the Sun he would hold the same view is questionable, but when even Clifford thinks that a story should never have been published you ought to sit up and take notice.

The Sun, predictably, still sees no shame in what it has subjected a 13-year-old boy to as a result of both their greed and his parents' initial attempts to gain financially from the situation they seemed to have found themselves in. There is no apology in today's paper, and no editorial comment defending their reporting of the story, which is even more pathetic than if they were bothering to defend their journalism. There is however, remarkably, a comment from the paper's agony aunt attached to the main piece on the story, headlined "[K]ids who are given no sense of values". A more applicable headline would be "Journalists who are given no sense of values", as quite clearly Rebekah Wade, a woman who has repeatedly campaigned supposedly on the behalf of children, such as for Sarah's law, saw nothing wrong with paying (or rather, not) for a story about teenage pregnancy when they hadn't bothered to even ascertain the basic facts or to give even the slightest thought to what the publicity they were about to come under would do those involved's already fractured psyches.

The not paying for the story or paying less than promised is not just a Sun technique, but is now seemingly increasingly a ploy used by all the tabloids. Most recently the Sunday Express apparently refused to pay for their exclusive about Jacqui Smith's husband claiming for watching two pornographic films on expenses, which came from the same source whom has since sold the full details to the Telegraph. Prior to that, the News of the World paid a lesser sum than promised to the dominatrix who secretly filmed Max Mosley taking part in an orgy, for which he subsequently successfully sued on privacy grounds. Most indefensibly, the News of the Screws also, despite signing a contract with Iraq veteran Justin Smith for an interview, worth £15,000, then tore it up and said they would "only pay £1,000, £1,500 tops".

These are the same people, it's worth bearing in mind, who are currently raging against members of parliament for their expenses fiddles and lies. Despite everything that can be justifiably thrown at MPs, none of their claims have directly affected individual lives; when newspapers renege on deals and use and abuse the likes of Alfie Patten, they care nothing for the damage they leave in their wake. The only way we will get the root and branch reform that is required in all areas of our political culture is not just through a general election, as the Sun is calling for, but through the throwing out also of the media barons that have done just as much if not more to coarsen and diminish our representatives while also thwarting reform that threatens them as much as it does those with their noses in the trough. Any reform that focuses only on parliament and not on the media also is doomed to failure.

Absolutely shameless.

You might recall I made a rather cryptic post at the end of March regarding a truly reprehensible piece of journalism which had appeared in the Sun being proved to be wholly inaccurate. If you didn't manage to work it out, I was referring to the Alfie Patten story, the 13-year-old who at 12 while looking 8 had apparently impregnated his girlfriend, although whether that's an adequate description of her is uncertain. There was at the time wide speculation that Patten was not the father (mostly incongruous that someone who looked so young was capable of being a father), and this was confirmed when the Mirror briefly put an article up on their website suggesting that was the case, in breach of an apparent court order, resulting in it disappearing within a matter of hours.

The Sun itself is now, without a hint of shame, "revealing" that Patten is not the father, presumably meaning that either they are now breaching the court order or that it's expired/been overturned.

It was always doubtful that the Sun's story was in the public interest, and I argued over on my own blog that even if it was, there are times when even if something is in the public interest, it shouldn't necessarily become public knowledge. In a case such as this, where the paper didn't even attempt to deny that it had paid Patten's parents for the story and where it was also clear that neither the parents or the paper had any real interest in the well-being of either the baby or the baby's juvenile parents, but rather respectively their own personal enrichment and their sales, with the Sun boasting of how its completely inaccurate article had resulted in it shooting to the top of the internet newspaper rankings, the Press Complaints Commission really ought to come down like a ton of bricks.

Equally clearly, the Sun has breached the PCC's code concerning children, especially the fourth clause:

iv) Minors must not be paid for material involving children’s welfare, nor parents or guardians for material about their children or wards, unless it is clearly in the child's interest.

It was arguable that even if Patten was the father, the effect on him from being thrust onto the front page of the nation's biggest selling newspaper was hardly likely to prove conducive to him being fully involved in the child's upbringing. Now that it turns out that Patten was not the father, there simply isn't an argument: if his parents hadn't gone looking for money, and if the Sun hadn't been looking for the latest terrible example of Broken Britain, then he would still probably have had to deal with learning that he was not the father after all, but not in the full public glare. This is the sort of thing which scars people for life: newspapers know this all too well, but Patten is the sort of individual who may as well not exist except as a commodity, someone who can be used and abused and then forgotten about.

The Sun, naturally, had already featured the claims of the boy who has turned out to be the real father. As Peter Wilby noted at the time, usually those who fear they might have been the one to have knocked up a one-time girlfriend deny everything. Seeing that there was potentially money to be made, at least two and as many as six claimed they were the father. Again, without the slightest irony, the paper quotes the boy's father as saying:

He has broken down in tears at the thought he might be the father. He thinks his life has been ruined by this.

He might well be right. Patten's life though undoubtedly has been, and a baby and her parents have got off to the worst possible start imaginable, all thanks to the greed and shamelessness both of their own parents and of a newspaper that quite clearly has no morals whatsoever.

The usual nonsense about "soft" sentences.

One of the main ways in which newspapers don't directly lie to their readers is by omitting key facts, especially when it comes to reporting, err, reports. For instance, while they were quick to draw attention to how low trust was in ministers and MPs according to a survey, they didn't bother to report that their own ratings in the same poll were even lower.

There's an even more crude example of something highly similar in today's editorial (url likely to change):

CRIMINALS are laughing at the soft punishments dished out to them, an official report concludes.

This really ought to win an award: there is not just one deception in this short sentence but two. The report, which can hardly be described as official when it was not conducted by the government or one of it's arms-length bodies, but instead by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, one of the liberal think-tanks the Sun would usually sneer at, didn't conclude anything of the sort. The Sun is referring to the views of just one of the twenty-five probation officers interviewed for the report. Here's the paragraph it's taken from:

More than half of our respondents thought that enforcement of Community Orders was more effective and more robust than it had been in the past. But there remained a feeling that not only was this necessary, but that enforcement might have to become even more robust because offenders were ‘coming out of magistrates’ court and they’re laughing their heads off and giving like two fingers to the Probation Service and what does that do for us as a service?’ (17).

Even this has been taken out of context. The probation officer wasn't referring to the offenders laughing at the community sentence itself, but instead to not being sent to prison when they've breached the order.

Back to the Sun:

Community sentences are a national joke. They are in place only to keep yobs out of the jails that Labour filled up without thinking to build any more.

Why would crooks take them seriously when they can openly ignore them and still not get sent to prison?

Except the report demonstrates this isn't true either. It notes that not everyone who breaches their order immediately gets sent to prison, but that openly ignoring them repeatedly almost always does result in the offender being sent down. The report's actual conclusions are summarised in the press release:

1. There was a fifteen-fold increase in the use of the Suspended Sentence Order in its first year and a twenty four-fold increase in the three years to 2008. Half of all Suspended Sentence Orders handed out in the magistrates' courts are for the less serious `summary' offences, suggesting that the Orders are being used too often and inappropriately.

2. Both the Community Order and the Suspended Sentence Order appear to be getting tougher and more punitive. Use of unpaid work and curfews has been growing. Both unpaid work and curfew requirements share punishment as a main sentencing purpose, suggesting an increased resort to more punitive requirements.

3. There is no evidence that the Community Order or Suspended Sentence Order are reducing the use of short-term custodial sentences or tackling `uptariffing'. The prison population has continued to grow alongside the increasing use of the two Orders. There is evidence that the sentences are displacing fines, rather than prison.

The report's press release then systematically debunks all the Sun's arguments. Not only are the orders not "soft", there's also no evidence that they are being used as an alternative to prison, rather that through breaches they might well be contributing to the rise in prison population. Furthermore, the interviews which the report conducts with the offenders themselves shows that almost universally they felt that they had benefited from the orders and their contact with the probation teams, far more than they would have done from simply being banged up. With a slightly more rigorous crackdown on those breaching them, as well as ensuring that they are used as an alternative to prison, the orders could have a far greater beneficial effect. All of this is completely ignored by a newspaper diametrically opposed to anything other than jail terms, except of course when it comes to the likes of Jack Tweed, today found guilty of a second assault offence, who was given the front page treatment last week because of his marriage to Jade Goody.

Prisons themselves don't however escape ignorant criticism:

But then, increasingly, neither are our jails.

Many are drug-ridden holiday camps. Regimes are so lax that violent thugs communicate freely with the outside world via Facebook pages they have set up on smuggled mobiles.

As jailed brute Ross Ajilo points out: “Incarceration ain’t working.”

And nor will it when prison is seen as little more than an inconvenience.

Those given the orders in the report certainly didn't see prison as an inconvenience: they were "relieved" to be given community orders, not just because they were seen as a less harsh punishment but also because they themselves knew that prison doesn't work, and not because they're "drug-ridden holiday camps" but because being banged up in a cell for up to 23 hours a day with other criminals doesn't even begin to help to rehabilitate them. As for the other points raised, the Sun could of course solve the problems of drugs in prisons and smuggled mobiles instantly. Incarceration ain't working because it has never worked, except for those who are such a danger to others and themselves that they need to be locked away both for their own and others' safety.

To add further insult to injury, it then makes a comparison:

WHILE we’re on the subject, here’s a REAL crime deterrent:

A long stay at any of Britain’s worst ten hotels.

Vile smells, mould, stagnant puddles in the shower, stains on the carpet, vomit in the sinks.

Just add padlocks to the doors — and judges will reduce hardened thugs to blubbing babies in the dock . . .

“You will spend 25 years at the Cromwell Crown hotel in Earls Court.”

This obviously isn't meant completely seriously, but if the Sun really thinks that there aren't all of those things and a lot lot worse in prisons then they must be living on another planet. It's probably not even worth stating actual examples, but the latest annual report by the prisons inspectorate found that one of the main concerns was "[U]nsuitable, cramped or unhygienic accommodation in some prisons". Anne Owers summed it up well in her report on Brixton:

“Brixton prison exemplifies all the problems of our overcrowded prison system. It has old, cramped and vermin-infested buildings, no workshops to provide skills training, and two prisoners eating and living in a cell with an unscreened toilet no more than an arm’s length away.”

The Sun would doubtless think this was a good thing.

P.S. Some exemplary hypocrisy from the Sun's deputy editor, Fergus Shanahan in his column today:

GOD help us if Harriet Harman ever gets her hands on power.

She wants the rule of law replaced by “a court of public opinion”.

That’s a polite way of saying mob rule.

This being the same newspaper which thinks that mob rule on matters such as social workers and paedophiles is a damn good idea. Shanahan also calls Harman, hilariously, "Harridan Harman"; as often seems to be the case when criticising female politicians, general misogyny seems to quickly enter the terminology.

Skeptics vs The Sun

You may or may not be aware of the weekly science Podcast "The Skeptics Guide to the Universe".

In this week's episode (#188) (mp3 link, starting at 21:32) amongst the usual stories, the commentators have a go at the Sun's coverage of scientific issues, specifically its recent articles about "Atlantis" appearing on Google Earth and Cat-Boy.

The Sun doesn't get favourable coverage. Its Atlantis coverage is accused of faking a quote from an expert (Dr Charles Orser) and due to the Cat-Boy report the Sun gets labelled as being the UK's version of the Weekly World News, i.e. it has no credibility what so ever regarding science.

Would you like any ketchup with that?

Virginia Wheeler. Now there's a reporter that's cropped up before here. And not for good reasons.
This time Virginias' been caught out peddling 'PC gorn mad' rubbish.

The Sun:

THE Red Arrows have been banned from performing at the 2012 London Olympics as they are too BRITISH.

Barmy organisers claim the popular RAF display team’s military background “might offend other nations”.

RAF Red Arrows:

We are very happy to tell you that the story is complete rubbish!

Oh and I would love to see someone eat their computer.
Picture: Private Eye.

Sharia - it's here!

Run for the hills - the Muslims are here and they're going to subject us all to Sharia law! It's true - it's in the Sun:

"ISLAMIC law has been ushered into Britain by the back door.

Ministers have quietly given Sharia courts power to rule on Muslim civil cases.

These range from divorce and financial disputes to domestic violence. But furious Tories said the step “pandered to Islamic extremists”. MP Philip Davies said: “There can be only one legal system — British law. This will lead to a segregated society.”"

Ministers have done no such thing - as anyone with a longer memory than 5 seconds will note once the Sun gets onto detailing how this has apparently happened:

Sheikh Faiz-ul-Aqtab Siddiqi, whose Muslim Arbitration Tribunal runs the courts, used a clause in the Arbitration Act 1996. It allows Sharia hearings to be classed as ‘arbitration tribunals’.

Uh, so it's nothing whatsoever to do with this government at all then? I'm fairly sure that we were still under the yoke of a certain John Major in 1996. This government hasn't given Sharia courts the power to do anything.

As you might have expected, this article appears to be based on one in yesterday's Sunset Times, which also includes another crucial fact:

"Jewish Beth Din courts operate under the same provision in the Arbitration Act and resolve civil cases, ranging from divorce to business disputes. They have existed in Britain for more than 100 years, and previously operated under a precursor to the act."

Now some, such as Melanie Phillips, who is unsurprisingly sympathetic towards Beth Din courts, claim that they are nothing like Sharia courts, and also that they aren't recognised under English law. Someone's wrong, but who it is I'm not sure. The United Synagogue website, which encompasses the London Beth Din, isn't terribly clear, but the closest it gets to suggesting that the Times is right is this passage regarding litigation:

"In Jewish Law, Jewish parties are forbidden to take their civil disputes to a secular court and are required to have those disputes adjudicated by a Beth Din. The London Beth Din sits as an arbitral tribunal in respect of civil disputes and the parties to any such dispute are required to sign an Arbitration Agreement prior to a hearing taking place. The effect of this is that the award given by the Beth Din has the full force of an Arbitration Award and may be enforced (with prior permission of the Beth Din) by the civil courts. At a hearing before the Dayanim, the parties do not require legal representation although they are allowed to have legal or other representation."

The reason why this is important is because of the Sun's leader:

"BRITAIN can have only one legal system. We thought the Government understood that.

In February, Gordon Brown said: “Religious law should be subservient to British criminal and civil law.”

Yet seven months later we learn that Islamic sharia law has been sneakily adopted into British law."

Err, but again, this is nothing to do with this government, and it hasn't been sneakily adopted into British law, unless it was without debate 12 years ago. If we're going to blame anyone, let's blame the Conservatives.

"A clause in the 1996 Arbitration Act allows Muslim tribunals to make rulings in civil cases using sharia law, enforceable by British courts, if both sides agree.

It means prejudice against women and leniency for violent husbands.

We must not allow this parallel justice system.

It is a major step down the dangerous path which sees Muslim communities living in isolation from the rest of Britain.

Just the kind of segregation under which extremism thrives."

Fair enough as it goes; no one is suggesting that Sharia law isn't completely unacceptable, not least that court which the Sun loathes so much, the European Court of Human Rights, which has ruled Sharia law is incompatible with democracy.

If we're not going to allow civil Sharia courts to rule on divorce etc though, when both parties are agreed, are we also going to allow the Beth Din to continue, considering that's also a parallel justice system, and which must also therefore encourage segregation and isolation? True, it might not be Jews that are strapping explosives to themselves and blowing other people up, or plotting to explode bottles of sugary liquid on airplanes, but it's religious law also. Isn't it that at the moment almost anything goes when it comes to criticising Muslims because of what they supposedly want (which the Sun also has a role in promoting considering the coverage it continues to give to completely unrepresentative morons like Anjem Choudary) while if similar comment was made on Jews and their similar legal system, the accusations of anti-semitism would be flying?

"The Government must plug this loophole."

Perhaps it might be more inclined to do so if the Sun and other individuals weren't blaming it for introducing the problem in the first place.