The Best Moment of 2011

The scandal that brought the most vicious media thugs to their knees.

The notion that nature will eventually run its course, even when it comes to the humbling of the most brutal bullies, came to a belated realisation with the News of the World scandal.

What a picture, to see that particular brand of vicious, foamin-at-the-mouth, self-righteous faux-moralistic fury turning on its own creators.

The succession of the nastiest bullies in the British media tumbling like sacks of rubbish in a garbage truck was just amazing: the arrest of Andy Coulson, the fall of Rebekah Brooks, News Corp withdrawing its BSkyB bid, and finally the News of the World going to the wall, while the two Murdoch thugs pathetically feigned amnesia in the background.

The phone-hacking scandal was just waiting to happen. When somebody's power to bully and intimidate with such impunity is allowed to fester to such poisonous proportions, it's just a matter of time til the putrefying boil bursts.

No doubt soon things will settle and hordes of dimwits are already stuffing their gob with the notion that tabloid thuggery (ie the indiscriminate phone hacking of murdered children, dead soldiers and grieving relatives) is none other than "free press".

But for a moment, just a moment, it was nice to see journalism in the UK back to a version of itself that doesn't resemble a cross between Shaun of the Dead and The Wicker Man.

Daily Mail typo of the year

Look at the caption above. It was visible until earlier this morning on the Mail online (alas it was later amended).

Steve Coogan 5 Jeremy Clarkstwit 0

Britain's top comedian slams Top Gear bullies.

You may have heard about the recent (minor) stir caused by Jeremy Clarkson the school bully and his two sidekicks Richard Hammond and James May with their latest round of embarrassingly lazy, xenophobic and unfunny comments.

After preying on the disabled and the blind (ha ha bet your sides are splitting), homosexuals and prostitutes, sweatshop workers and various nationalities that aren't the B-R-I-T-I-S-H (to be uttered in a proud, low-pitched tone), this time the three idiots decided to pick on the Mexicans.

However, the best answer to the current wave of testosterone-fuelled Clarksonite brand of bullying dressed up as "the-right-to-a-bit-of-fun" came from legendary comedian and Alan Partridge-creator Steve Coogan.

His article for today's Observer is just spot-on. Especially when he refers to "the regular defence you tend to hear – the tired line that it's 'just a laugh', a bit of 'harmless fun'" and to "the current "'postmodern' reaction to overzealous political correctness, [...] a licence for any halfwit to vent the prejudices they'd been keeping in the closet since Love Thy Neighbour was taken off the air".

The public mauling of Chris Jefferies

How the concept of "innocent until proven guilty", one of the pillars of British democracy, is being butchered by the tabloid press.

By now you're all probably familiar with the fresh display of tabloid barbarism seen in the wake of the tragic murder of Jo Yeates.

In brief, in the 72 hours that sandwiched the arrest and then the release of suspect Chris Jefferies in connection with the murder, the media handed him some diabolical public guillotine for the sake of a few extra banknotes basted in lynchmob froth.

No-one, not even the police, knows whether Mr Jefferies has anything to do, or not, with the murder. In fact, no-one will know until a trial takes place.

But the fact that Mr Jefferies hasn't even been charged yet seems to have completely eluded the tabloids. They've already passed their verdict, dishing all the dirt they could dig up in order to destroy him.

The news massacre has been so mental and OTT that even Attorney General Dominic Grieve went on record expressing his concerns that the current coverage of the Jo Yeates murder may be in breach of the Contempt of Court Act as well as an impediment to the ongoing legal proceedings.

The following articles are a fine analysis of the public mauling of Chris Jefferies:

Mark Thompson ("The media need to stop these witchhunts") focuses on the astonishing collection of what he dubs "ridiculous nudge-nudge, wink-wink comments" and generally anything that will make Chris Jefferies look as weird as possible.

Jerry Hayes ("The hounding of Christopher Jeffries and anyone who is different") makes the excellent point that "[i]f [Mr Jefferies] is charged, British Justice assures him of a fair trial. But if he is not charged or acquitted, his life will never be the same again. He will be regarded as that strange, eccentric, blue rinsed loner, somehow connected with a death".

Finally, Enemies of Reason ("Chris Jefferies and trial by media") draws parallels with the character assassination and [the] targeting aspects of people's private lives" as already seen in "the trials by media undergone by Colin Stagg, Robert Murat, Barry George, the parents of Madeleine McCann and the first man to be accused of the Ipswich murders of 2006 (who was leater released without charge)".

How the Daily Mail peddles hatred against the jobless

Distorting news and fuelling prejudice since 1896. And still getting away with it.

You can say what you want about the Daily Mail but "incoherent" they're not. For them, 2010 is drawing to a close exactly the same way it began: talking rubbish.

Look at the way this article misleads in order to fit the tabloid's own toxic agenda.

"The job refuseniks: How 750,000 of the dole queue have turned down or quit work" is the headline.

Of course, with no further details immediately at hand, the implication is that 750,000 of the current unemployed are taking the piss.

But a quick fact-check shows that the Daily Mail is deliberately distorting facts. The "750,000" people the right-wing tabloid is referring to are not at all from "the dole queue", let alone the current one, but they're a combination of:

- people who left jobs (or were fired for misconduct) who then tried to claim benefit but were caught out, fined and therefore denied benefits;

- people who refused job offers, even though the Daily Mail steers well clear of specifying why that was the case. Whether the applicants did not have access to transport, or child care, or any other reason, Britain's naffest tabloid doesn't think it matters. They're all scum, they're unlucky, kick'em while they're down.

Most importantly, the figures refer to the period between 2000 and 2010, that is to say 10 years, and NOT to the current "dole queue".

This is a crucial fact, because 750,000 people over a period of ten years are one thing and 750,000 people all in one go are another, yet the Daily Mail doesn't think it's worth specifying it at all until a brief mention in the second part of the article.

Now. People of a very superficial ilk like to sputter that Britain's tabloids are harmless and that they play no part in affecting (some would say poisoning) the country's cultural and political debate.

And yet, just think of the amount of people who don't have the time, the patience or the attention span to go past the poisonous headline that "750,000 of the dole queue have turned down or quit work".

Many will have interiorised the Mailesque belief that, yes, three quarter of a million dole recipients in this country are basically workshy vermin scum and don't deserve to be in receipt of any benefit.

You know what to do next time you've run out of Andrex.

Jan Moir's playground whataboutery

Has the Daily Mail's star columnist got cognitive problems?

You can always rely on quality analyses from the Daily Mail.

Like today's column by Jan Moir. Remember her? The woman who last year prompted record numbers of complaints for performing homophobic rituals on Stephen Gately's grave and then landed the 2009 Stonewall Bigot of the Year Award.

The thing with Moir is that she is also desperate to win the Mail's Biggest Bully Award. What lets her down, however, is the flimsiness of her writing.

Look at the playground-brand of whataboutery she's deploying in her feeble attempt at character assassination on Jemima Khan.

According to Moir, Khan's crime is that she supports Wikileaks' Julian Assange but not Dutch Islamophobe Geert Wilders or US Pastor Terry Jones, the religious nut who thinks publicly burning the Qur'an is a good deed.

And that's not all. Apparently Jemima Khan should never have said the following to critical journos:

"Calling me “a socialite” is such a lazy way for journalists to undermine me and the Assange defence".

Moir thinks this makes Jemima a hypocrite. "That's free speech for you babe. Freedom of information", the homophobe writes.

Which makes you wonder if she can actually read and understand texts properly. Because Khan's sentence has got fuckall to do with free speech or lack thereof. Jemima Khan didn't say "silence those critics, ban them or burn them at the stake". She just said that that particular criticism directed at her was "lazy".

The good news is that if this is the current state of Britain's right-wing tabloids, then we really do have plenty of reasons to cheer up. Perhaps having a government that tickles their fancy is actually sapping their critical spirit.

To finish, Jan Moir's icing on the cake: "But the rest of us reserve the right not to take [Jemima Khan] quite as seriously as she takes herself". Yes, you braindead idiot, that must be why you wrote an entire "opinion column" about her.

Tabloids, baying mobs and Charlie Gilmour

Aware that public sympathy is not on their side, the coalition and their media need all the red herrings they can get hold of.

It's that time of the year again when Britain needs its fix of collective hysteria.

Like two years ago when BLOOD OF A SOCIAL WORKER became the backdrop to our lives, and last summer when the phantom PC BAN ON THE ENGLISH FLAG provoked widespread rage, the baying mob is back - whipped up by the country's tabloids - pitchfork and torches, gnashers grinding and white foam building up at the corner of the mouth.

Like foreigners and single mums, social workers and PC councils, 21-year-old Charlie Gilmour is already learning what it means to be the target of tabloid-inspired scapegoating and witch-hunt in this country.

Within hours of the Sun and the Daily Mail revealing his name and personal information, the bloke who was photographed swinging like a fool from the Union Jack at the Cenotaph became the focus of cyber lynchmobs baying for his blood.

Look at the succession of Facebook groups that sprung up like mushrooms.

Jail Charlie Gilmour, Never employ Charlie Gilmour, Charlie Gilmour is a Cnut! (sic), CHARLIE GILMOUR WANTS SHOOTING, Prosecute and imprison Charlie Gilmour!, I hope Charlie Gilmour dies slowly very soon, Charlie Gilmour - Vilest brat in Britain!, Charlie Gilmour is a disgrace to his country JAIL HIM!, Charlie Gilmour needs to be fucking hung.

And that's without counting the hate-filled comments and calls for "revenge" on the tabloids' websites: displays of pure loathing scary enough to make the Wicker Man look like In The Night Garden.

Overnight this Charlie Gilmour turned into the most hated man in Britain, an "evil man" who should die a slow death, be hung, shot and devoured alive by a pack of rottweilers with advanced rabies.

And why? Because he swung from the Cenotaph. An incredibly idiotic thing to do, if you ask me. An ignorant and disrespectful act. One that, if anything, gave ammunitions to those who already hate demonstrators by default.

But, seriously, have we really lost our minds that we can get so worked up to the point of readily dispensing death wishes so publicly and light-heartedly?

What is it with this country that some people get more exercised by symbols than they do when political and corporate abuse vandalises their lives on a regular basis?

Why is it that people can go nuts - literally - over a rich kid swinging from a flag and not even blink when stories pile up of unwarranted police violence against protesters? Where's the outrage when a disabled demonstrator is pulled from his wheelchair and dragged around by the police not once, but twice?

"How dare you insult your country", writes the Sun. Fair enough. But where are the cries of disservice to the reputation of British democracy and where's the bile when the police are caught lying through their teeth in order to cover up some of their most thuggish behaviour?

And why does the baying mob get so incensed by the fact that Charlie's dad (Pink Floyd's David Gilmour) is so rich, but then they don't mind that they themselves will lose jobs, struggle with cuts and much higher living costs courtesy of a government where 18 out of 23 members of the cabinet are millionaires and aristocrats? No outrage there? Where's the scorn poured at "privileged boys who will not be hit by the crisis" when you really need it?

Charlie Gilmour would've done an infinitely better job if he'd stayed at home. But there's no law that makes joining protesters who are less well-off than you a crime. And, come to think of it, no legal cap on protesters' income either.

The Coalition and their mates in the media know public sympathy is not on their side. In their desperate quest for red herrings to shift the focus of the discussion from what really matters, they need all the Charlie Gilmours they can get hold of.

Nothing, at the end of the day, is more threatening to a government than peaceful mass demonstrations.

The effects of 40 years of Page Three

Some people say the Sun's most popular feature is 'harmless fun' at best and 'unimportant' at worst. But is it really that simple?

It's forty years since the Sun began sporting tits on Page Three on a daily basis.

When then-Sun editor Larry Lamb first made his gamble in November 1970, few expected the idea to deliver such a massive boost in sales and popularity.

The Sun is today the most popular paper in the country. By far. If newspaper circulation is the yardstick by which a country's obsession is defined and, for instance, Italy's most popular La Gazzetta dello Sport typifies a nation of football fanatics, one would conclude that Britain is literally obsessed with tits, gossip and sex scandals.

Rupert Murdoch's title sells well in excess of three million copies a day, completely dwarfing the circulation of any other broadsheet or tabloid.

Which is why the red top's celebration of their "watershed moment" has triggered a minor debate over whether this type of tabloid behaviour represented a turning point in British popular culture.

Did it help an insanely prudish country shed its sexual inhibitions and hang ups or did it just kickstart a race to the bottom with a more crass and cheaper society?

In other words, is it ok to stick pictures of topless ladies so unrepresentative of womanhood at large for the sole benefit of arousing the base instincts of certain geezers? Is it ok for that to become absolutely normal? Is it prudish, pedantic, middle-class or feminist to wonder - even if just for a second- whether most women would find that debasing or offensive?

Of course, like gossip and scandals, naked pictures had obviously existed before but, with Page Three pummelling bare-chested ladies down the country's throat on a daily basis, this became run-of-the-mill stuff.

Defenders of Page Three see it as a simply cheeky, naughty and fun idea. It's just harmless fun, a billion-making machine that illustrates the country's sense of humour and love for a bit of tacky. In the words of a blog called Mediasnoops, for instance, it's just "a bit silly, a bit immature but largely of great unimportance", stuff that "only middle class feminists with too much time on their hands" care about.

Others, instead, contend that it's "about as funny as the Black and White Minstrel show" and that the normalisation of naked female bodies (of the type idealised by a male-dominated society only), is the epitome of "[S]exual objectification as a part of neoliberal social conditioning" and the symbol of "[women's] unequal status" (Laurie Penny, New Statesman).

So who's right? Are the "harmless fun brigade" correct that Page Three has nothing to do with the normalisation of vulgarity, or is it true, to quote Francis Gilbert's book Yob Nation, that "[the Sun] set the template for modern media culture [by making] topless girls, sex scandal and celebrity gossip a staple of the breakfast table"?

Perhaps we should consider how "harmless" it is when Page Three girls get routinely used as mouthpieces for the Sun's editorial (and political) line -- think of those speechbubbles where topless Giselle, 20, from Essex, expresses her admiration for David Cameron's war on scroungers, or whichever political crusade the Sun is involved in on the day.

What would they say if tucked between a dance off, a panel's opinion and a Bruce Forsythe catchphrase, Strictly Come Dancing also contained a regular feature were leggy dancers made cheeky swipes at the immigrants?

What if popular Premier League matches were also perused to play dog whistle politics, perhaps by having Wayne Rooney, Steve Gerrard or other stars lifting a banner that says "sack public sector workers" , "bomb the crap out of Iraq" or "single mum scum" each time they scored a goal?

Would they still believe the effect would be "totally unimportant"?

Isn't whipping up baying-mob hysteria under the cloak of tits and various lairy stuff actually more disturbing and more poisonous than it if was plain and simple politics?

And, finally, while I cannot judge how women would feel on the subject, I find it so unnecessarily shallow and geezery when concerns regarding the effect of Page Three on sexist attitudes are laughed off as stuff for "middle class feminists with too much time on their hands".

Just look at what happened when a female politician tried to do something about it.

When Clare Short launched a campaign "to remove the degrading images of women as available sex objects [...] circulated in the mainstream of society through the tabloid press", the former MP for Birmingham Ladywood was literally torn to shreds and bullied into submission (of course, in a "fun and cheeky way") until the subject was dropped.

Like Clare Short wrote in her autobiography in 2004:

"A woman journalist asked me at a lunch whether I was still opposed to Page 3. I said I was and this led to busloads of Page 3 girls parked outside my house all day in the hope of setting up embarrassing photos, and mock-up pictures of me as a very fat Page 3 girl. They even sent half-dressed people to the house I share with my 84-year-old mother in Birmingham and had people hiding in cars and chasing me down in the street in an effort to get embarrassing photographs. I dealt with such attacks by not looking at the paper, but it's oppressive to have a double-decker bus plastered with Sun posters outside the front door from seven in the morning".

"Unimportant or not", for that reason alone, I wish Page Three a very unhappy birthday.

Daily Mail race obsession gets worse

Are you British but not white? The issue is really bothering the Daily Mail.

The right-wing rag is widely known for its routine pieces on "Britain to become mega overcrowded by 2030/2040/2050 [select year at random]", "migrants rob jobs and steal packed lunches" and "'too many immigrants' warns objective anti-immigration think tank", generally based on a selection of myths and half truths.

But in an article appearing in today's edition (complete with trite picture of a crowded city street, yawn), the poisonous tabloid goes one step too far in emulating BNP literature.

"White Britons 'will be outnumbered' if immigration continues at current rate", is the appalling headline, a classic piece of scaremongering based on a number of quotations from one Professor David Coleman of Oxford University.

The academic, as quoted by the Mail, seems to be especially worried about skin colour, drawing a clear dividing line between white and non-white Britons.

Which is what makes the article particularly obnoxious: the "concern" no longer being just about non-British people outnumbering British people, but about people of a certain skin hue, which is exactly the kind of game the BNP has been playing for years.

Do we really - in 2010, while you'd have thought this kind of shit died out decades ago - do we really have to remind the Daily Mail and Professor Coleman that many people are as British as the Queen even though their skin colour may be another?

Are they aware of how appalling it is to place under a "different" category millions of people who may have been British for generations and are still made to feel alien (as if their Britshness was not quite the same or, worse, something to resent altogether)?

For the record - and needless to say the Daily Mail makes no mention of this - Prof Coleman is not an objective source, but the co-founder of right-wing lobby group Migration Watch, an organisation known for its cavalier use of statistics when issuing those press releases that make up half the content of the Daily Express and other UK tabloids.

In the past, Coleman also became the focus of some controversy for its connections with the Galton Institute, formerly known as Eugenics Society (see here and here for details).

Where's the bucket?

Brace yourself. This isn't going to go away for a while.

Stop thinking everyone.

Time has come to switch off those cogs and no longer ask questions about those petty old things: employment prospects, cuts, tax and education. What do all those quibbles matter when placed in front of such a Royal display of austerity?

BBC News yesterday already paved the way: 45 minutes of non-news about Prince William tying the knot and not a word on the recent debates on cuts, tuition fees and the rest.

The tabloids have gone into spasm. The Sun and the Daily Mail are talking about nothing else, with bits about the royals currently taking over all top news items on each website.

Again, in fairness, talking about scroungers is what they do best.

The Daily Mail on fry-ups

Quality press at work.

The Daily Mail, 26 August 2008: "Traditional full English fry-up 'may raise risk of bowel cancer by 63 per cent'". "The extra calories can also lead to obesity, which is linked to many types of cancer and heart disease", added the article, dishing out paranoia like only the Mail can.

But nevermind all that. This is what the Daily Mail "reported" on 1 June 2010: "Why the British fry-up is the healthiest breakfast of all...". The article revealed that "the traditional English breakfast is one of the best starts to the day" and that "eggs are filling and can help you to eat fewer calories over the rest of the day".

Daily Mail slams tan addiction!

A disturbing journey through Britain's most poisonous rags' relationship with tanning.

Why are we still dying for a tan? is one of the Mail's headlines today, a report on "how irresponsible in the sun [...] Brits have always been".

While raising awareness over the dangers of malignant melanoma is certainly praiseworthy, it may be interesting to take a look at how the same paper routinely ridicules pale people.

Take Girls Aloud's Nicola Roberts, for example, the only member of the band proudly shunning the Cristiano Ronaldo/Fanta Orange/fake tan looks.

The Daily Mail seems incapable of writing a piece about Nicola Roberts without involving at least one complexion-related playground insult. Last year, for instance, the very same paper who now asks why our young women are so dangerously addicted to tanning sported the headline Ghostly geisha Nicola Roberts pales in comparison to Girls Aloud bandmate Nadine Coyle on celebratory night out.

A one-off? Not quite. Has she gone too far?, the Mail asked in 2008, clearly troubled by what it dubbed Roberts' "deadly pallor", arguing that "sandwiched between her perma-tanned Girls Aloud bandmates Cheryl Cole and Kimberly Walsh, Nicola, with her exceedingly pale skin, it appears she may have gone too far".

It's not all. Last year, the Mail's piece about Girls Aloud joining Coldplay onstage at Wembley was accompanied by the following headline Seen a ghost? Nicola Roberts pales after Girls Aloud join Coldplay onstage at Wembley.

A few months ago, Daily Mail columnist Liz Jones wrote that Nicola Roberts "was so thin she looked like a ghost".

You can spot a regular pattern here. Britain's moral compass thinks that pale skin is weird, scary and ridiculous in equal measure. Ask yourself how many of its regular or casual readers may internalise the idea that "pale is bad" and be tempted to head for the nearest tanning salon.

Still, don't fool yourself that it's a Daily Mail-only phenomenon. Their main rivals-in-bullying -- the Sun, that is -- hardly fare any better.

Look at this useless, rickety, 4-line long piece that Britain's best-selling paper published last March. It obviously had no purpose other than taking the piss (or "avin a larff, get a bleedin' sense of humour, will ya, geezah?") out of Nicola's complexion.

Girls Aloud has 'ghost star' in Nicola Roberts was the headline, complete with the deep observation that "yesterday she looked more ghostly than ever as she left her hotel. It's enough to give anyone a fright". A proud display of Top Quality Journalism indeed.

"Somehow, dying of ignorance is less shocking than the prospect of dying of vanity", is how today's Daily Mail piece end.

Wise words. But perhaps they could do with sorting out their own lot first. Looking up the words "poison" and "hypocrisy" in the dictionary would be a start.

Still unconvinced? Take a look at this (h/t Daily Quail).

The appalling Daily Express

Sean McCormack challenges the latest outburst of xenophobia coming from Britain's tabloids.

[This is a guest post]

It's not often I do any sort of writing anymore, and its a hell of a lot longer since I did anything politically motivated but something in the past few days just hasn't sat right with me.

Look at the picture and take a minute to think of exactly what that frontpage headline says and what they're getting at. Got it? Good.

Now I reckon most if not all of the people who read this post will think the same thing.

The Daily Express is implying that in the near future, one in five people in Britain will be non-caucasian. And just to make sure that their dear readers' anger is pointed in the right "ethnic" direction, take a look at the photo that accompanies the online version of the story.

You see that don't you? It's two women covered head to toe in the dreaded niqabs. And just to hammer home the point that these horrible ethnics are going to be taking over, one of them is pushing a pram. Probably with a terrifying little brown baby inside that will take a school place from a good Christian white child.

Now obviously the Daily Express likes to do this sort of thing. When its not talking about how house prices and single mothers killed Princess Diana and abducted Madeleine McCann, its talking about foreigners. And the way it talks about foreigners is getting worse. Some headline examples we've had in the past few months from the Express and its sister paper the Daily Star:

"The BBC puts Muslims before YOU!"
"Keep Out! Britain is FULL UP!"
"Strangers in OUR OWN COUNTRY!"
"Foreigners take ALL new jobs in Britain!"
"Foreigners take 90 PERCENT OF ALL NEW JOBS!"
"Foreigners take 85 PERCENT OF ALL NEW JOBS!"
"Foreigners take 70 PERCENT OF ALL NEW JOBS!"**

Basically if you're not a white, British, Christian, straight person, the Express and Star have got it in for you.

The reason yesterday's headline got me thinking though was that it sits an awful lot closer to home for me, and many many of my friends on Facebook.

The Daily Express takes its figures from a study commissioned by The University of Leeds. Now I know for a fact that no department in any university would be OK with a newspaper turning a study into out an out racism, but especially so because Leeds is a very open and welcoming environment. The amount of multicultural and multilingual societies at the uni is really impressive, and a very good thing in my opinion. So I delved a little deeper.

It turns out that the report clearly states that the biggest rise in any "ethnic grouping" (horrible term imho), is going to come from white/caucasian immigration from Australia, Ireland and the United States.

Notice something those countries have in common? English speaking. And this something that MIGHT happen by 2051.

It's not a prediction, it's a population forecast, and as I learnt from my geography lessons at school and in uni, population forecasts are horrendously unreliable.

Did you know the British population was widely forecasted to have reached 80 million by 2010? Thought not. Yet funnily enough the Express doesn't mention this until the very end of the article, something which most Express readers will miss thanks to the headline and accompanying photograph screaming at you that those horrible brown people are going to get us.

On a personal note, after reading the article it turns out that I'm also one of the dreaded "ethnics". Yep. Seriously. I'm one of those people who've come over here and stole your jobs, benefits, women, cheese etc. My grandparents are Irish, therefore that makes me an ethnic minority. Funnily enough, the Express seems fine with that.

**Over a period of about 6 months they kept changing their minds.

Daily Star: "BOOZE BABES & BETS"

Base instincts, geeza.
Literally.

Robert Green gives immigrants a breather

The tabloids have stopped ranting against immigrants, evil foxes, social workers and the EU. That's because they have a new obsession: England's goalkeeper.

Unless you spent the weekend in outer space you may have heard that a clumsy mistake by untested goalie Green cost England the victory in their opening World Cup game against the US.

If an external observer were to make a guess on the basis of newspaper coverage, they would probably conclude that Green's clanger got England knocked out. Or maybe that it cost them the semi-final, the final or even the World Cup itself. Instead, it was only a 1-1 draw in the opening game.

Yet - as usual - hysteria and hyperactivity is reigning supreme amongst England's red tops.

For once though, the target is not immigrants, asylum seekers, social workers, killer foxes or the EU. It's Robert Green.

The country's "patriotic" tabloids are obviously unaware that all the pressure they're now cooking up is going to make the goalkeeper - and the whole team too - even more self-conscious and nervous. This, rather than Green's blunder on Saturday, may result in an early flight home.

Take a look at them.

The Sun dug up Green's sentimental past. In a piece called 'Robert Green: I've let nation down' (one of the many about the West Ham player), the tabloid happily announced that the goalkeeper "let his gorgeous girlfriend slip through his fingers just weeks before the South Africa tournament began". The report comes with a picture of his ex-girlfriend in a bikini.

The Daily Mail, still revelling in the BP-related Britain-v-US diplomatic spat, gives extra coverage to the so-called internet viral about "Soccer and oil spills" .

As it does its bit to keep the atmosphere calm and level-headed, the Daily Mail sports the headline 'James furious at Fabio Capello over World Cup opener snub', even though the article does not contain a single quote, not even a second-hand one, to support the story. Other pot shots at Robert Green include 'No excuse! Robert Green can't even find friends in the goalkeepers' union' and 'Calamity! Robert Green faces England axe after his howler hands Americans a draw'.

As for the Express, their stories are: ROBERT GREEN PLAYS GOLF AND FINDS A BALL GAME HE CAN GET TO GRIPS WITH and ROBERT GREEN SQUIRMS AS ENGLAND FLOP IN USA GAME.

The Mirror is host to 'The Rob Green debate'; "Drop or keep?" is the paper's big question, amongst revelations that the goalkeeper is "pleading for a second chance".

No pressure, eh?

Cars vs foxes: which poses a bigger threat?

Watch out foxes: tabloids are out to get you.

Following the fox attack on two sleeping baby twins in Stoke Newington, an enormous amount of press coverage has been given to the apparent threat posed by foxes.

Of course what happened in North London must have been truly scary. It was a real tragedy and our sympathy goes to the family as we wish the two children a prompt recovery from their injuries.

However, this accident has proven a textbook example of how the British press loves to scream "tragedy!" and "outrage!" without any sense of proportion or perspective. To say that reports on the alleged "threat" posed by foxes were distorted and over the top is an understatement.

Foxes are at risk of turning into the new social workers.

Just look at the photos selected to accompany many tabloid "reports" of the incident. They didn't just show a fox. It had to be a snarling sinister one too. Just in case you weren't convinced of what "vicious pests" those animals are.

Let's be logical about it. How many panic-laden TV reports or tabloid pieces do you read about children killed in traffic accidents?

And yet every year there is an enormous amount of kids losing their lives on UK roads. According to the Child Accident Prevention Trust, in 2008 131 children under 16 were killed in traffic collisions. Almost 23,000 were injured.

According to the NSPCC, the number of child homicides (that is, at the hand of adults) has averaged 79 a year for the last 28 years.

More news. Each day 55 pre-school children need hospital treatment for burns and scalds in domestic accidents. That's each day - in Britain.

In 80 years, no child has ever been killed by a fox in this country, whether in urban areas or in the countryside.

There are more chances that someone will be killed by lightning (5 people each year in the UK) than there are of foxes attacking humans.

The incident in Stoke Newington was the second reported of its kind in eight years. In 2002 a similar one in Kent resulted in a baby getting injured.

It's quite obvious that, as per usual, the press at large (not just the tabloids) are enjoying preying on people's fears. They obviously think the image of a fox on the rampage can turn into a juicy news story. Maybe because injuries caused by a wild animal strike some chord with our subconscious, as it may evoke childhood nightmares or similar.

But then again, the Sun or the Daily Mail rarely do "perspective" anyway.

The Sun blames Lady GaGa

The singer sparked "fury", apparently. Only in the Sun's newsroom though.

For a country where tabloid-led witch hunts and collective hysteria are the order of the day, the reactions to the tragic Cumbria shootings have been surprisingly sober.

Most parties accept that no law can shelter society from an unpredictable switch flicking like it did in Derrick Bird's case.

Beyond a call or two in favour of even tighter gun laws and a few questions on how quick the police were to react, no-one has attempted to whip up hysteria and make political hay of such a tragedy.

That is, until the Redneck's Gazette, widely known as The Sun, decided that a focus for outrage had to be found regardless.

Within 24 hours of the Cumbria murders, the target came in the guise of Lady GaGa (Lady Gore Gore- Lady GaGa sparks fury with cannibal-murder scene in stage show).

According to The Sun, it's "sick" that the singer's current UK tour includes a stage act featuring red paint and death poses.

So does the Sun expect every single videogame, CD or DVD in the country with the slightest reference to violence to be taken off the shelves too?

Can that "paper" function without concocting faux outrage, even when it's so blatantly meaningless?

The lexicon of doom

A quick journey into the industrial tons of "crowing" churned out by the Mail, daily...

One day scientists are going to come up with findings that reading certain tabloids really is detrimental to the reader's health. It can induce misery, depression, negativity, fear, paranoia and hypochondria.

I don't know if today is a particularly negative one but, as you quickly scroll through today's edition of the Daily Mail Online, you find that almost each single headline contains at least a word of severe doom.

The overall result is so gloomy that, put next to it, a Radiohead or Joy Division track would look like a Vengaboys song by comparison.

If you feel unconvinced, just check this roll call of despair from today's headlines:

...19 activists are killed in a bloody Israeli commando raid; Girl, 15, raped...; Falling 30ft nightclub sign knocks woman unconscious; ...badly sunburnt baby...; Girl, 5, severly injured after being mauled by American bulldog; Katie Price's unhappy family day out; Huge clouds of sand looms large over remote village; Near death experiences explained...; ...rare hormone disorder sees her weight QUADRUPLE; ...'killing kit' of saws, knives and body tissue; Tragedy of brilliant student [...] altitude sickness; War on bogus sales...; Britain's got talent will end with suicide if ridicule continues, warn mental health experts; American cage fighter rips out still-beating heart...; ...teenage fisherman found dead in remote pond; ...Now cabin crew threaten to strike through summer; Being at birth 'can make fathers feel a failure and damage paternal bond'; Former model kicked in the face with stiletto...; Britain shivers on typically chilly bank holiday...; Miracle escape for drummer who fell from balcony and impaled his head on a fence; BP oil leak could last for month...; Royal Marine killed by explosion...; Frenchman with no arms or legs swims set to swim 22 miles...; Career women battling with alcoholism; etc etc...

I need to make myself a cup of tea.

Policeman just told me to take off my England shirt...

...what's the going rate for a tabloid interview about it?

The other day we wrote about the imbecilic paranoid "siege mentality" of nationalism as the sole possible explanation for the urban myth that police are banning England tops from pubs during the World Cup.

Within days the ban on tops doubled up as a ban on flags and, in no time at all, tabloid non-stories multiplied. Apparently, the "Cornish banned England flags", as did PC managers at rubbish collection companies and taxi firms.

Needless to say, the urban myth is snowballing. Outraged Facebook groups have been mushrooming up and the stories, each increasingly embellished, have multiplied on forums and various websites where people are venting anger and frothing at, to quote the Daily Mail, the "clampdown on public patriotism".

Nevermind it's a non-existent clampdown, like flies following a cantering horse's arsehole, those "outraged" Facebook groups members and tabloid commenters insist it's "time2 make a stand" and "take off ur turban too cuz im offended by it2".

But then, courtesy of both Tabloid Watch and Enemies of Reason, I discovered that there's even more to it.

There is now a new and even more pathetic breed of associated stories coming to the fore.

I'm not suggesting that someone, somewhere, may have spotted a milking cow or a golden goose (or an horse's arsehole, to continue with our earlier analogy).

I'm just asking a question. If a clever person contacted the Daily Mail, or the Daily Star, or a local paper, with a story like this ("Driver orders toddler off bus for wearing 'offensive' England football shirt") or this ("Policeman told me not to wear England shirt, claims woman"), how much dosh would they offer?

And if this same person then also agreed to pose with their kid for couple of pictures holding a slightly concerned face while proudly wearing the patriotic outfit, would the papers stick an extra pony on top of the initial offer?

Because it's quite baffling that more similar stories are springing up which fit the outraged they-won't-let-us-fly-our-flags tabloid posturing like a turd in a toilet bowl.

But the real drama is that these stories are all turning out to be untrue. The "evil foreign bus driver" one was followed by a full investigation by the bus company. They concluded that "no such incident took place". The bus was packed, apparently, but nobody saw any evil Eastern European driver kicking a kid off the bus for wearing an England top. Needless to say, the Mail didn't publish any of that.

Similarly. Dorset police could not trace the officer mentioned in the "Policeman-told-me-not-to-wear-England-shirt" fable. And it couldn't have been otherwise, as the force stated categorically that such behaviour is not part of their policy.

So here it is. This morning I was going about my own business when a police officer, accompanied by a man from the Council's Diversity Office and also by an Eastern European bus driver (who also turned out to be Muslim), stopped me and ordered me to take off my Alan Shearer shirt.

As I expressed my objections, they all replied that I had no other option other than to follow their orders. And when I noted that walking around with my torso on display was not the best idea, they handed me a made-in-France European Union t-shirt.

If any tabloid is interested in finding out more about it, please contact me at the usual e-mail address. I offer competitive rates.

The 'siege mentality' of nationalism

The tabloids are unable to deal with patriotism without turning hysterical: the equivalent of an aggressive pisshead unable to handle his drinks, convinced that they're all looking at him funny.

Why can't people just be proud of their country and their flag without having to turn their nationalism into a brain-dead Neanderthal-like fetish based on paranoia and "siege mentality"?

Like clockwork, with each World Cup or Euro Championship comes the urban myth based on some grand anti-English design or some hollow conspiracy theory whipped up by tabloids for the populace to consume.

The fact is, an alarming number of Brits are happy to be treated like imbeciles the moment there's a whiff of international football in the air.

And so you may have heard of the current uproar surrounding the myth that police are trying to ban England football shirts and flags in pubs and public places during the World Cup.

The rumours appear to have been kickstarted by (make a wild guess) the Sun when they published an article under the header "Bid to ban England tops in World Cup pubs".

Anyone with more than a brain cell would have detected that the headline had nothing to do with the facts. The article itself refers to none other than "suggestions" sent by the Met to a few pubs in Croydon with a history of football-related disturbances. Just a couple of non-compulsory tips about hiring security staff and introducing dresscode restrictions (see Tabloid Watch for a better analysis).

Yet the frothing at the mouth took no time to kick in. Several Facebook groups (see here, here and here for a sample) were set up before you could even utter the word "idiot" and, like dogs who've just been ordered to sit, lie down, bark and run, people started spewing up disturbing amounts of online rage, working themselves up against not just the "PC brigade" and "elf & safety" killjoys, but also immigrants (see this delightful group called "if our england tops am banned your sari should b2")!

And yet police forces up and down the country have been stepping forward to dispel the myth. Staffordshire police said that "there is no truth in [the rumours] whatsoever", while West Midlands Police denied that there is any directive whatsoever about a ban. A spokesperson dismissed the rumours as "nonsense".

But, no. That's not enough. The Sun seems to be unable to show its "patriotic" credentials without having to whip up more imbecilic siege mentality. They just can't do it, can they?

And so the tabloid decided to produce the headline Ooh-arr ya? Cornish ban England flags. Except that no such thing ever happened in Cornwall or elsewhere. The Sun just concocted the headline on the basis of a Facebook group comprising 55 people and a quote from a man representing the minute Cornish separatist movement. That became Cornish ban England flags. You can only imagine the outrage amongst Sun readers.

Today the Daily Mail joined in with the words "Clampdown: Workers are increasingly being banned from flying England flags", based on two stories about a private refuse collection firm in Liverpool and taxis in Canterbury not being allowed to wave flags for visibility reasons. Nevermind the taxi firm made it clear that "[they] have been fully supportive of [taxi drivers] wearing England shirts", the Daily Mail insists it's a "clampdown on public patriotism".

Again, siege, threats, bans, enemies, paranoia: the equivalent of an aggressive pisshead unable to handle his drinks - as he works himself up that everyone's looking at him funny.