Madeleine McCann: Britney Spears, Lolita And Birthday Cards
MADDYWATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann
DAILY MAIL: “Woolworths forced to withdraw LOLITA bedroom furniture range for girls”
The Lolita Midsleeper Combi, a wooden bed with pull-out desk and cupboard designed for girls aged around six, retails on the Woolworths website for £349.99
The name has “sexual connotations”. A “mother” sees it and writes: “Am I being particularly sensitive, or does anyone else out there think it’s bad taste for Woolies to have a kiddy bed range named ‘Lolita’?”
Well, you don’t have to buy it…
A spokesman for the company says: “What seems to have happened is the staff who run the website had never heard of Lolita, and to be honest no one else here had either. We had to look it up on Wikipedia. But we certainly know who she is now”
Trusting Wikipedia for information has its own dangers. (And look out for an article on the state of British education.) But no danger is bigger than a bed named, perhaps, in honour of a charcter in a novel by Vladimir Nabokov
Or Lolita Fatjo, pre-production coordinator for Star Trek
Or many other women called Lolita
“On-line parent power has been growing in recent years. In 2006 Tesco stopped selling a pole-dancing kit on its website over accusations it was destroying children’s innocence. And last summer an on-line campaign by Mumsnet resulted in a cinema advert about the disappearance of Madeleine McCann stopped from being screened before the children’s film Shrek the Third”
THE TIMES: “Staff at Woolworths baffled by fuss over the little girl’s bed called Lolita”
“Woolworths has withdrawn bedroom furniture for young girls bearing the sexually charged name Lolita after a campaign waged by a mothers’ online chat room”
An internal company e-mail seen by The Times goes: “As discussed, we’ve got the product below on our website. Can it be hidden as soon as is possible? Then I really need to find out how it came about being on our site and who bought it. Lolita is a word that means sexually active young teenagers, so a young girls’ range of bedroom products is in very poor taste. We’ve had an approach from a website who are clearly a little disturbed by this”
THE SUN: “Gift from Maddie for twins”
No, not furniture
“Twins Sean and Amelie McCann will get a special present from their missing sister Maddie today on their third birthday. Parents Kate and Gerry got the gift for the pair who, at three, are the same age as Maddie when she vanished last May”
Sad. But is it relevant to the case? Is it news?
Grandmother Eileen McCann tells us: “Of course Madeleine being there would be our dream but we’ll do our best to make sure the twins have a lovely day”
DAILY TELEGRAPH: “Card from Madeleine at McCann twins party”
The twins are getting a gift in the Sun…
“Gerry and Kate McCann will throw a birthday party for their twins tomorrow - complete with a card from their missing four-year-old daughter, Madeleine”
DAILY STAR: “MISSING MADDIE’S SPECIAL PREZZIE”
“Little Sean and Amelie McCann will open a special present from their big sister as they celebrate their third birthday today”
With a card?
Says Eileen McCann: “There will be presents galore, lots of fun and games, lots of food and a big cake. Of course, Madeleine being home would make it complete and we continue to pray for that blessing”
SUR (Spain): “Marbella suffer their first loss of the year against Linares”
A football match: “Wearing T-shirts to raise awareness of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann and Mari Luz Cortés, the children playing in the tournament accompanied the players onto the pitch as mascots at the beginning of the game”
RADAR: “Theater of Cruelty, Carnival of Souls”
“British rags hardly pretend to be providing straightforward news. What they are doing is what used to be the job of popular fiction; namely, processing myth out of characters sucked in from real life. Right now the cast list includes such durable regulars as Kate Moss—with or without Pete Doherty—Princes Harry and Wills, Posh and Becks, and Kate and Gerry McCann, whose daughter Madeleine’s kidnapping/disappearance in Portugal made them last year’s headliners”
ALISTAIR CAMPBELL (TIMES): Britney Spears: person or news commodity? She’s a great singer but obviously ill: we in the media have to decide to leave her alone”
Britney Spears and Madeleine McCann..?
“In some sections of the media, Madeleine McCann and her family are there. As I said in the Cudlipp Lecture on Tuesday, her disappearance was an interesting and important story, the stuff of every parent’s nightmare. But it quickly became a commodity in which most of the media got close to hysteria, and some have remained there. Let us not pretend the coverage was driven by concern for the child - there are many missing children - or compassion for the parents - certainly not once the mood shifted - or regard for the truth. It has been the worst example of recent times, on a par with Diana, of some newspapers thinking that the word “Madeleine” sells, and finding literally any old nonsense to keep her name in that selling position on the front”
THE GUARDIAN: “Mechanics of the McCann campaign - Professional media management may have generated coverage of Maddy’s disappearance, but it hasn’t helped with public sympathy for the family”
“Try as they might neither Clarence Mitchell nor Justine McGuinness could quite shake off the sense that the way they’ve managed this case might have contributed to some negative public sentiment towards the family. In place initially as what Mitchell described as “a buffer” between the shocked and distraught parents and the world’s media, hungry for news about Madeleine, it’s clear that what developed was a professional media management operation. With city PR firm Bell Pottinger on hand - primarily, we can assume, to defend the interests of their clients Mark Warner Holidays - as well as Justine and, latterly, Clarence with all their experience of Westminster spin, the McCanns could not have wanted for more professional advice. But as time went on media management itself - and once you’ve started feeding stories to the press to get control of the agenda, you really can’t stop - began generating negative reaction from other parties”
Madeleine McCann: Making news and sensation from grief
Posted: 1st, February 2008 | In: Madeleine McCann Comments (1,022) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink
Comments
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February 1st, 2008 at 10:43 pm
874
slyfox Says:
February 1st, 2008 at 10:38 pm
857
Denzylle Says:
February 1st, 2008 at 10:20 pm
847
Christine Says:
782 - Denzylle
If you’re still around - hence the comment from GM:
“We have our own family now” ? Which begs the question, was Madeleine not part of the family
**************************************
I remember that but I thought GM said ‘We have our own ‘children now’
I thought it was odd to and it was quite recent I think.
————————————————————————————————————
I’d like to comment but feel that I really need the context of the quote before I should.
Can anyone else help…?
February 1st, 2008 at 10:43 pm
864 firestar
A lot of people close to them benefitting.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:41 pm
857 Denzylle
It was in an interview that GMc gave and I saw it on you tube. I don’t know if anyone can help me here. I’ve got a good memory and Gerry was being interviewed on his own. It may have been the Glasgow interview where there wasn’t much of an audience and Gerry was being deep and sincere. It was also discussed here, definitely way before Christmas. I don’t save things but I do remember the things that really hit me.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:41 pm
Happy birthday, Brandon and Karen
Sc46 hello!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just a quick drop in - got wet nails - off to a ball tomorrow.
This party?
What about Heathrow.
Wave bye bye to the McConns as they jet off to Portugal on a long, well deserved holiday at the expense of the Portugese tax payers.
Can I come as a search dog? I can bring several border collies, including one pregnant one.
They can play with Cuddle cat.
xxxxxxxxx
February 1st, 2008 at 10:41 pm
876 blame - too angry typing there!
February 1st, 2008 at 10:41 pm
873
Cheryl
Which ompletely ignores the fact that Madeleine was failed - a fact regardless of their abduction story or other peoples suspicions.
So the blam lies where?
So why should they be allowed to pretend tey are qualified to tell people about cross border security etc etc? How dare they presume to tell us how to deal with any aspect of childcare!
February 1st, 2008 at 10:38 pm
sly i don’t hold with the sedation caused death theory myself - if there were syringes lying around what other use could they have been put to???
February 1st, 2008 at 10:38 pm
857
Denzylle Says:
February 1st, 2008 at 10:20 pm
847
Christine Says:
782 - Denzylle
If you’re still around - hence the comment from GM:
“We have our own family now” ? Which begs the question, was Madeleine not part of the family
**************************************
I remember that but I thought GM said ‘We have our own ‘children now’
I thought it was odd to and it was quite recent I think.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:36 pm
821
Stevo Says:
February 1st, 2008 at 8:56 pm
Cheryl
You said “Whatever, there are two sides to every story”
_______________________________________
Meaning what?
If you’re on about Ian Huntley do you mean he lied in his side of the story? If you’re on about Shipman do you mean he killed 250 women and didn’t tell anyone for his side of the story? If you’re on about Jeffery Dahmer do you mean his side of the story was to describe eating dead bodies? Or…do you mean like Denis Neilson who used to kill people and have the dead bodies sat in his living room watching TV with him?
Is this the “other” side of the story you keep telling us there are two sides to?
_________
REPLY: That is an expression, you know that, Steveo. Very simply - there are two sides to this tragedy - the Mccanns are stating one thing - one side of the story (tragedy); the majority of people who don’t believe they are innocent of whatever - are stating their side of the story (tragedy).
Let’s see okay a good example: a couple of getting an acrimonious divorce - you have her side of the story and you have his side of the story as why the marriage fell apart.
—————-
Mods and Admin
But there is a 3rd side to this story.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:35 pm
Have you clocked the creepy guardian at the entrance to Metodo 3s website?
http://www.metodo3.es/eng/entrada.html
February 1st, 2008 at 10:35 pm
new txt/streettalk abbreviation IMI (in my imagination)
February 1st, 2008 at 10:32 pm
val - very good point when did they go back to rothley to get this. However the police not obtaining a sample of maddies dna imo is luditosh
they collected ample samples from the appartment, and some from each of the family members so they would have been able to establish maddies dna imo.
Unless of course there was some truth in the rumour of biological parentage, in which case they may have found it difficult to establish that it was maddies. IMO maybe this was why they contacted everyone who’d stayed at mw for a sample ???
who knows - hopefully we will soon
February 1st, 2008 at 10:32 pm
826 Stevo
Without being part of the medical establishment I can’t really know whether they would be willing to take the risk of something going wrong and not having any facilities to deal with it. Unless it was just another version of a well known childrens sedative such as say ‘calpol extra- a bit stronger- where, if you were a parent you would think ‘what the heck it was a pretty safe risk.
And if that was the case, wouldn’t they (the trial managers) rush her off to some ‘friendly local clinic where they had connections to deal with the problem quetly. There’s nothing like that that I’m aware of in, or near Ocean PDL.
To be honest, there’s so many if’s and buts with this that I could think of all angles and write pages and pages.
However, the McCann’s do seem to have a hold on their medical/pharma/and related media connections.
I’m more inclined to think that they have manipulated people around them to make them think that it is a pharma’ related death. I remember a recent article talking about the dangers of an existing widely used medicine for children. Can’t remember if those containing aspirin or cough medicine. Wouldn’t it be much more damaging financially for the companyto have a child death as a result of a medicine that is successful in the market and vastly profitable to a company? Gerry would know this.
Maybe they were using Calpol ‘night’ which is relatively new but the name association with existing calpol could have been drastic PR for the company that produces it.
Maybe the McCanns were pocketing money from dealings related to their profession, but I would be very surpised if it was a trial of a totally new drug on their kids.
So I’m still of the view that GM and Kate used the sedation drug to covertly blackmail others into getting involved but that it was they who had a hand in their death.
All IMO of course.
oh no1 another long post.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:32 pm
i’m going to warm up in the bath i think, its freezing in here.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:32 pm
Here’s the details beside the tennis pic:
Madeleine McCann missing
Undated McCann family handout of missing Madeleine McCann taken during the family’s holiday at Praia Da Luz, Algarve, Portugal.
Issue date: Saturday, September 15 2007. See PA story POLICE Portugal. Photo credit should read: PA Wire
Date: 14/09/2007
Picture by: PA/PA Wire/PA Photos
Image Size: 1344×2776
___________________
Notice the hi-res size! But more importantly notice it’s a non-standard size!
February 1st, 2008 at 10:31 pm
861 noseycow
I always find it’s when humans stop failing that they become interesting. lol.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Ian
I said AP news photos earlier…I meant PA Photos…got a bit dyslexic there for a moment.
I’m looking through 1600+ pics of the McCanns. Lots of useful info beside each pic.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:29 pm
859
Stevo Says:
February 1st, 2008 at 10:25 pm
849
firestar
I know…it looks like a Blue Peter project.
At least we can see Calum isn’t profiting from the fund at anywhere near 50K/month
————-
i was forgetting.
isn’t it some coppers kids that did the sites?
seems strange to me to hire all these expensive people for the lawyering and pr,then let some mate’s kid do what is, in effect, their worldwide face to the public.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:27 pm
what happened to the diary report about Maddie being hyperactive and KM not able to cope etc.?
February 1st, 2008 at 10:27 pm
848
firestar
Yes and I think we need to know more about the kind of people the McCanns knew/met in Amsterdam. Probably the seeds were sown back then….literally!
February 1st, 2008 at 10:26 pm
man on hill - unfortunately there are some conditions that diet alone can not cure, you are right of course if we were all as health conscious as yourself, and took responsibily for our own bodies perhaps we would all be healthier and some pills would not be necessary - however most of us are only human and have human failings… thats what part of what makes the human race interesting IMO
February 1st, 2008 at 10:26 pm
850 Noseycow
844 Stevo
Here”s another interesting snippet I noted and meant to post.
“The Police never attempted to obtain “control sample”(what does that mean?) of Madeleine”s
DNA, the McCanns found traces of her saliva from a pillow at home in Rothley and provided these to PJ. There was no trace of DNA in car and Apartment.
1. Why did the McCanns have to go to Rothley when Cuddlecat could have provided the
sample, or any of her clothes which would have been in the Apartment.??
2. How could PJ possibly accept the pillow DNA, it could have come from the twins pillow.??
3. When did the McCanns go back to Rothley to obtain this sample. ??
February 1st, 2008 at 10:25 pm
849
firestar
I know…it looks like a Blue Peter project.
At least we can see Calum isn’t profiting from the fund at anywhere near 50K/month
February 1st, 2008 at 10:24 pm
852
noseycow Says:
well now at least they can say they have the perfect family - 2.4 children
————————————————————————————————————
I d0 remember a comment to the effect that KM found three children ‘difficult to manage’ after increasing her family by 200%.
And I remember thinking ‘ well, now, it has been reduced to two, she should find it much easier’.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:20 pm
847
Christine Says:
782 - Denzylle
If you’re still around - hence the comment from GM:
“We have our own family now” ? Which begs the question, was Madeleine not part of the family
———————————————————————————————————————————–
My laptop is the first thing I switch on in the morning and the last thing to go off at night. But - in between - I’m in and out of Anorak and often occupied elsewhere.
When, and in what context, did GM make this comment?
February 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
it’s the sick kid bit that gets me, ’shit! is she reacting the same way?!!!’
February 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
Actually its the one on the Free Kate McCann webshite.
x
February 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
837 noseycow
I’m sorry if i looked out of balance as i probably wouldn’t be hear if it wasn’t for antibiotics. However, I never at any point feel ‘fit and active’ on government drugs if i have to take them. It might be useful to point out that i have a very natural diet and have done for years. I now can no longer eat or drink any of the food that i used to simply because it is too toxic for me. This food is considered safe by 99% of the population. In reality all cooked food is toxic and will give you unpleasant side effects. What i am trying to say is that i am an expert on detoxing crap out of my system and government drugs are some of the most unpleasant substances you can stick into yourself.
February 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
sorry bad taste i know
February 1st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
well now at least they can say they have the perfect family - 2.4 children