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We don’t just report off-beat news, breaking news and digest the best and worst of the news media analysis and commentary. We give an original take on what happened and why. We add lols, satire, news photos and original content.
Dad dragged off plane for ‘sex trafficking’ his 3-year-old daughter
A man and his 3-year-old daughter on a United Airlines flight to the US from Mexico were taken from the plane. A passenger saw the pair and wrongly assumed the man was sex trafficking the child. The man was carrying his and her passports and a legal letter from the child’s mother giving her approval for the trip. But one passenger thought they looked iffy.
The child’s mother, high school teacher Maura Furfey, tells The Huffington Post:
After our 3-year-old snoozed on her father’s lap for most of the flight, the plane landed. He texted me to tell me they had arrived. When the plane taxied to the gate, however, a number of officers from the Port Authority and Customs and Border Patrol boarded the plane, approached my husband and instructed him to grab his carry-ons and follow them. He and our daughter were escorted out of the plane before anyone else could get off.
Once out of the plane, four officers from Port Authority and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) surrounded them. They fired so many questions at him that he didn’t know who was asking what. He had no idea what was going on. Our daughter started to cry in all of the commotion.
After asking about where our daughter was born, who was there, and where her birth certificate had been issued, they asked for my phone number; that was when they called me, asking me the same questions in order to verify the story. At that point they seemed satisfied that my husband was not, in fact, trafficking our daughter. They then told me that this accusation was not coming from the CBP, who were trained to identify these kind of situations, but from a passenger on the plane. They were following protocol to act on reported suspicions such as this.
…also forced to work as domestic servants, drug mules, in sweatshops and restaurants, or as beggars or pickpockets. The case of ‘Adam’, the Nigerian boy’s torso found in the River Thames, raised concerns that trafficked children are being used for ritual killing.
And very soon murder is linked to fostering and families seeking better lives for their children:
Between 8,000 and 10,000 children, many from West Africa, are being privately fostered in the UK. Many could be being abused or exploited, without anyone even knowing that they are in the country.
It all sounds horrific. But the facts are unclear. Nonetheless UNICEF still manages to come up with a number:
Worldwide, over a million children are trafficked each year.
But that’s not a fact. It’s a guess.
UNICEF is working internationally to prevent child exploitation from happening in the first place, but legislation is needed to deal with the crime once committed and to act as a deterrent.
Such are the facts.
Canary Islands ferry tests out sea defences by ramming sea wall
How do you test sea defences? In Las Palmas de Gran Canaria in the Canary Islands, you set the ferry to ramming speed and go for it:
Videos and photos of the accident appeared quite serious, although no injuries have been reported.
The ship involved was the Volcan de Tamasite and, according to information received by The Canary, 140 passengers were on board at the time, though nobody seems to have been seriously hurt, some reports have mentioned up to four people with minor injuries.
Looking at the state of the wall inspires little confidence.
Madeleine McCann: seeking the man by The Dolphin
Madeleine McCann appears on two national newspapers front pages today. You can read more about the Mirror’s news on a top cop’s theories here.
So much for the opinion. What we who have followed this story from the outset crave are facts.
The Express has actual news on the actual investigation into what happened to the missing child. The paper leads with the “phone box clue” to “Missing Maddie”.
James Murray says:
DETECTIVES are investigating phone calls made from a telephone box in Praia da Luz in a bid to trace a man acting suspiciously shortly before Madeleine McCann disappeared.
Indeed. It is odd. Who uses a phone box these days?
The story goes that Adrian and Lizelle Marais, a married couple working at an eatery called The Dolphin close to the phone box, spotted a “strange” man who “looked similar to a photofit of a suspect”. Their restaurant is around 700 metres from the Ocean Club, where Madeleine McCann was staying.
So which suspect are we looking at? We’ve seen a few in the media. The paper notes:
That led Portugal’s public prosecutor to order all phone records for the call box to be checked in an effort to find the man, who has never been traced.
Adding:
The prosecutor made the order on the grounds that the man may have abducted or murdered the lost three-year-old.
And so the jump is made. From being man at phone box at a busy summer holiday report, he is now someone who “may” have murdered a child.
We then get to which “suspect” the story relates to.
The call box is 50 yards from the spot where a man carrying a child similar to Madeleine was seen by Irishman Martin Smith and his family, who had been dining at the Dolphin at around 9pm on the night she disappeared.
Mr Smith’s account formed part of a Crimewatch reenactment.
Policia Judiciaria files on the case outline what Lizelle told officers the day after Madeleine vanished. The report states: “The person used the public telephone for long periods of time, always more than 10 minutes. To her, the person did not appear to be either a tourist or a resident. One time she had passed close to him and had felt ‘strange’ but did not know why.”
Mysterious stuff. But not new. Just old and in light of no developments in the case over ten years, still worthy of a look. And, as the Star proves with its interpretation of the Express‘ story, anything can be vital in the mystery of ‘Our Maddie’. Says the Star: “Madeleine McCann: Phone box may be key to finding Maddie.” Or not.
Posted: 23rd, April 2017 | In: Madeleine McCann, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment
Madeleine McCann: five theories, three ex-coppers and 10 years of nothing
Madeleine McCann: A look at reporting on the missing child. It remains frenzied, speculative, lurid and light on news.
Daily Mail: “Did Madeleine McCann wander off and have an accident? Was she stolen to order? Or was it a burglary gone wrong? Detective lays out theories about her disappearance.”
In short: did any crime befall Madeleine McCann? The detective isn’t sure if one did. But, then, he’s isn’t a professional detective. He’s a “former Scotland Yard detective” who “believes he has come up with the five most plausible theories to explain the disappearance of Madeleine McCann”.
Only five. This is progress. On May 10 2007, the Daily Mirror produced SIX theories. They were: the “PAEDOPHILE GANG”, the “LONE PAEDOPHILE”, the “JEALOUS MOTHER”, Madeleine wandering off and “DROWNED”, the “OPPORTUNIST PAEDOPHILE”, the “CHILDLESS COUPLE”.
Colin Sutton is the “detective” with the five-fingered theory. He first told it to the Mirror, which is the source for the Mail’s story.
Daily Mirror: “Was Madeleine McCann stolen to order, taken by lone paedo or did she just wander off? The scenarios that could explain her disappearance.”
Sutton’s Five Theories that could be useful are:
1 The McCanns or the Tapas Seven
The McCanns have been libelled. Take care. Speculation hurst lives. Says Sutton:
I can understand why the Portuguese police asked questions about the McCanns and the Tapas Seven. As uncomfortable as it is, the first place I would have started looking is their group. Without any other information to go on, the most likely scenario when a three-year-old girl disappears into thin air is that someone close to her knows what happened.
However, the police do appear to have decided quite quickly that was the only line of investigation they were going to take.
By concentrating just on that scenario they may have missed tips or other lines that meant going down a completely different investigation route.
After that he adds a further four theories:
2 Targeted kidnap by a trafficking gang
This is the most likely scenario once those closely linked to Madeleine have been ruled out.
Concluding;
Given all the facts we know, it’s the most likely and credible scenario.
But why did they take her?
A trafficking ring is more likely than a lone paedophile or paedophile ring. Yes there are paedophiles, yes she is a little blonde girl. But I think six and seven-year-old girls are much more at risk from paedophiles or child abuse rings.
Paedophiles target blonde girls more than, says, brunette or black girls? We know that the media prefers blonde victims.
Looking at the trafficking angle, unless the order was specifically for a young blonde girl, why her and not one of the twins?
Dunno. Got a theory?
Babies have less memories than a three-year-old. If Madeleine is alive she will probably remember she had another mother and father and used to live in another house.
Probably. Or not. The theories contain more theories.
If you were stealing on spec you would have taken one of the twins. Not both, just one. So it goes back to a specific order for a young blonde girl.
Has a young blonde girl died and their parents want to replace her? Or is there another reason for stealing to order? When you pick it all apart it’s the most likely scenario.
He picks, but he comes up with no answers, just more questions. The scab grows back over the wound:
3 She wandered off and had a fatal accident
He says Madeleine McCann left Cuddle Cat, her toy, behind. He says the fact of the toy remaining in the holiday flat makes this theory unlikely.
4 Opportunist abducted her
This is less likely than other scenarios. The chances of a predatory paedophile just happening across Madeleine and being able to abduct her without being detected are just so remote.
Sarah Payne, right, who was eight (when she was killed by Roy Whiting in 2000), and five-year-old April Jones (who was killed by Mark Bridger in Wales in 2012) are probably the only cases that match something like that.
Yeah, Probably.
5 Killed as part of a burglary gone wrong
This is extremely unlikely. If you have got a burglar who has gone into the apartment for material theft, the chances are once they find there are kids in there they will run a mile.
The Mirror concludes this flight of fancy by telling readers: “Anyone with information about Madeleine McCann’s disappearance should call the Find Madeleine investigation line on: 0845 8384699 or email: investigation@findmadeleine.com.”
Exactly. If you know anything, tell the police. If you know nothing, tell the readers.
The Sun: “MADDIE SUSPECTS – Convicted British paedo, heroin-addicted burglar and bogus charity collectors among main suspects in Madeleine McCann disappearance, says top cop.”
The top cop is Sutton As as for the smack head being a child snatcher, well, he told the Mirror: “Junkies don’t take three-year-old girls.” The convicted British paedo is Raymond Hewlett. He’s dead.
Having conjured suspects from the ether, the Sun adds in a second story: “WAS MADDIE KIDNAPPED TO ORDER? Top Brit ex-cop says Madeleine McCann could have been snatched by traffickers to replace grieving parents’ own dead child.”
As Sutton of the newsroom guesses – is that big reward still on offer? – and the newspaper lap up his thoughts, the Mirror turns to another ex-cop for more theories.
Sunday Mirror: “Ex-top cop breaks Madeleine McCann silence to say where he thinks she was taken.”
Madeleine McCann was snatched and taken to a warren of caves nearby that have never been searched, a Portuguese investigator has suggested.
The theory comes from ex cop Paulo Pereira Cristovao – who became the boss of Portugal’s missing children agency in the same year the three-year-old disappeared.
He says: “I think this case has lots of mistakes – from many persons, from many situations, from the police and maybe from the government. At the end of the day we all forgot one person: Madeleine McCann.”
No. We don’t. There has been ten years of reporting on the case. The innocent child has not been forgotten – she has, though, be turned into the benchmark for all missing children and used to sell papers. And, like all ex-ops with opinions, Cristovao didn’t take long to add a “maybe” to what he thinks.
We’re not told why Cristovao is talking now, only that he has imagined what he’d have done if he had kidnapped a child in Praia da Luz. He thinks Madeleine McCann is dead:
“I put myself in the role of someone who knew nothing about the streets or the region. Where would I put the body of a girl? I stood at the apartment door – to the right is the town of Portimao. There are lots of people there, lots of buildings. If I had kidnapped her that’s not the way I’d want to go. I would want to go left, and find the first side road. I put my car on that road, and I went straight to Burgau. It’s a nearby beach, with a lot of rocks with caves.
“It’s a good place to put somebody. As far as I know the police never went there, because you would need divers.”
As far as he knows. Good idea to check, no? Aren’t facts useful when you’re investigating and theorising?
“In a case where you hear theories like aliens and gypsies kidnapping Madeleine, I think this is as good as all the others.”
Alien abduction is notoriously hard to verify. Police divers looking in a lake less so.
“We’ve heard theories so stupid over these 10 years,” he adds without irony.” When we don’t understand something, we complicate it. I think sometimes – always – the best solution is the simple solution.”
Clydebank Post: “Madeleine McCann breakthrough: Aussie TV show claims to have solved mystery of tot’s disappearance.”
Pull up an armchair. You too, detectives.
Channel 7’s Sunday Night show has released a teaser clip of this weekend’s programme in which it promises to be a “landmark television event”.
The video claims the show has a new line of inquiry which could bring investigators closer to solving the mystery of the youngster’s disappearance.
Trailing a theory about what happened to Madeleine McCann is grim. A post on the channel’s Facebook says:
“The disappearance of Madeleine McCann has continued to captivate the world for nearly ten years. Maddie was only three years old when she vanished from her family’s holiday apartment in Portugal. The police search that followed became the largest in Portugal’s history – but no trace of the missing toddler was ever found. Now, new developments in the case could finally reveal the truth about what happened to little Maddie.”
Could. Or could not. Stay tuned. We’re right back after these ads.
Daily Star: “Madeleine McCann: Missing Maddie now 13 and looks like THIS.”
She’s alive! The Star knows it. In the paper’s rush to dash out an “exclusive” artist’s rendering of what the child might look like, it produces this (below). The person on the left looks a lot like Kate McCann.
Daily Record: “Cop in Madeleine McCann case remains utterly unrepentant after damning book blaming Kate and Gerry.”
The hatchet job on Goncalo Amaral begins:
Despite becoming a shadow of his former self, Goncalo Amaral still has no sympathy for the parents of the missing youngster.
F*** the policeman:
On the side of the run-down apartment building, the grafitti reads “Foda a policia”. You don’t need to be fluent in Portuguese to figure out the expletive-laden translation.
This crime-ridden Lisbon estate is home to the ex-detective once tasked with solving Madeleine McCann ‘s disappearance.
In the early days, he was alleged to work just four-and-a-half-hours a day. Sporting a large beer belly, he regularly enjoyed three-hour lunches.
Amaral, 57, split from second wife Sofia in 2012, blaming the pressures of the case. He moved back to the tough Lisbon suburb of Olivais, where he grew up. His expensive suits and fedora are gone.
So too has the beer belly and chauffeur-driven Mercedes, replaced by a battered Citroen Picasso.
His slimming is a negative?
But the arrogance remains – as the Mirror discovered when we confronted Amaral last week. Amaral also refused to apologise for the mistakes that hampered the early days of the probe. Instead, he threatened to have our reporter and photographer arrested.
But it was his cruel refusal to offer any sympathy to Kate and Gerry that was the most damning.
Is the purpose of the Mirror’s barrage of ‘Our Maddie’ articles aimed at securing an exclusive with the McCanns?
Daily Mirror: “Madeleine McCann’s parents Kate and Gerry met as junior doctors and had perfect life until their daughter vanished.”
That’s pretty much the entire story, which shows no sign of reaching an end.
Such are the facts.
Posted: 23rd, April 2017 | In: Madeleine McCann, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment
Fearless Girls: the marketing gimmick that mocks the bull
That Fearless Girl statue in Manhattan’s Financial District is terrific. It faces off against Arturo Di Modica’s Charging Bull. Greg Fallis has written a terrific blog post about the two statues and placed both in context:
Back in 1987 there was a global stock market crash. Doesn’t matter why (at least not for this discussion), but stock markets everywhere — everywhere — tanked. Arturo Di Modica, a Sicilian immigrant who became a naturalized citizen of the U.S., responded by creating Charging Bull — a bronze sculpture of a…well, a charging bull. It took him two years to make it. The thing weighs more than 7000 pounds, and cost Di Modica some US$350,000 of his own money. He said he wanted the bull to represent “the strength and power of the American people”. He had it trucked into the Financial District and set it up, completely without permission. It’s maybe the only significant work of guerrilla capitalist art in existence…
And that brings us to March 7th of this year, the day before International Women’s Day. Fearless Girl appeared, standing in front of Charging Bull. On the surface, it appears to be another work of guerrilla art — but it’s not. Unlike Di Modica’s work, Fearless Girl was commissioned. Commissioned not by an individual, but by an investment fund called State Street Global Advisors, which has assets in excess of US$2.4 trillion. That’s serious money. It was commissioned as part of an advertising campaign developed by McCann, a global advertising corporation. And it was commissioned to be presented on the first anniversary of State Street Global’s “Gender Diversity Index” fund, which has the following NASDAQ ticker symbol: SHE. And finally, along with Fearless Girl is a bronze plaque that reads:
Know the power of women in leadership. SHE makes a difference.
Note it’s not She makes a difference, it’s SHE makes a difference. It’s not referring to the girl; it’s referring to the NASDAQ symbol.
Fearless Girl is terrific. But she’s selling something in the belly of commerce.
Via: Greg Fallis – read it all.
Banned in Australia: Ayaan Hirsi Ali is unfit for human consumption
Anyone who bought a ticket to hear Ayaan Hirsi Ali speak on her Australian tour will get a full refund. It’s been cancelled because her opinions as so outrageous they present a threat to her security and the safety of every Muslim in Oz. Stick a ‘BANNED” label on a record cover or book and we all want to listen to it. Ayaan Hirsi Ali might think about getting “Banned in Australia” on a T-shirt or a medal.
She’s banned because when 400 Muslim women petitioned for her to be stopped from spreading her “divisive rhetoric” and thus amplifying “hostility and hatred towards Muslims” the State caved in. Hard won freedoms about speech and thought were obliterated. Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s words are unfit for human consumption. No debate. No ridicule. No Q and As with her sympathizers and accusers. Just banned.
Ali, a campaigner for women’s rights and a strident critic of Islam, which in her words is “a destructive, nihilistic cult of death”, is taboo. A woman who was abused under Islam cannot criticize it. However potent or toxic Ali’s view is, banning her quashes progressive moves for the airing and exchange of ideas in a public space. It increases separatism, otherness, division, conformity, intolerance and misunderstanding. Ideas hermitically sealed in closed groups fester and curdle into something claustrophobic and suffocating.
“Shame on you for carrying water for the Islamists, shame on you for trying to shut people up who are trying to raise awareness about sharia law,” said Ali is response to the ban. “We can’t have that open discussion, we can’t stop the injustices if we say everything is ‘Islamophobic’ and hide behind a politically correct screen. We should not make the mistake of finding ourselves inadvertently allied with the Islamists, as these petition-signers are doing.”
The event, “Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Hero of Heresy”, was advertised as an opportunity to “step inside the controversy” surrounding Islam and Muslim womanhood. The controversy rumbles on, albeit in private.
Spotter: SMH
Brexit blamed for Croydon attack on Kurdish asylum seekers
Grim news from Croydon, where a 17-year-old Kurdish-Iranian asylum seeker has been beaten up as he and two friends – also Iranian Kurds – were at a bus stop. Police are calling it a “hate crime”, which of course it is. Any violent attack is hateful. The Mail calls it a “suspected ‘hate crime'”.
Why are the police so sure it was a hate crime and the Mail and Guardian less certain? According to the CPS: “A Hate Incident is any incident which the victim, or anyone else, thinks is based on someones prejudice towards them because of their race, religion, sexual orientation, disability or because they are transgender.”
If you think it is a hate crime, then it is a hate crime. Were the thugs who beat up three teenagers waiting for a bus looking for asylum seekers to further a racist cause or violent people looking for an excuse to hit someone? The police know. The rest of us should be less certain.
We should also wonder why existing laws are not enough and the State thinks we need a new kind of crime to cover what looks like a brutal attack?
What happened?
The teenager was set up by upon by up top eight other youths, who chased him down the road and kicked him unconscious. Croydon’s Metropolitan Police Borough Commander, Ch Supt Jeff Boothe, calls it “a frenzied attack by a large number of people”. As the victim was being kicked, “members of the public [were] asking them [his attackers] to stop”. This “horrendous and frenzied attack” only ended when the police arrived.
Gavin Barwell, Croydon Central’s MP, labels the attackers “scum”.
Det Sgt Kris Blamires has more:
“At this early stage it is believed that about eight suspects approached the victim as he waited at a bus stop with two friends outside The Goat public house in the Shrublands. It is understood that the suspects asked the victim where he was from, and when they established that he was an asylum seeker they chased him and launched a brutal attack. He has sustained critical head and facial injuries as a result of this attack, which included repeated blows to the head by a large group of attackers.”
Four 20-year-olds, a 24-year-old woman and 24-year-old man have been arrested.
The Agenda.
But can this attack be politicised? Can any agenda-driven soul find political mileage in a violent assault about which all facts are not known? Yes. Al Jazeera links the attack to Brexit. The police – those right-on champions of civil liberties – know a hate crime when they see one. Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary, Diane Abbott, tells the Sun: “Sadly, this is not an isolated incident but part of a sustained increase in hate crimes that this Tory government is yet to offer any effective response to.”
She adds: “With rightwing politicians across the world scapegoating migrants, refugees and others for their economic problems, we are seeing a deeply worrying rise in the politics of hate. We must make clear that there is no place for anti-foreigner myths, racism and hate in our society.”
It’s no longer a very nasty incident outside a pub at 11:40 on a Saturday night. It’s a politically-triggered attack. Well, it is if you want it to be.
Posted: 2nd, April 2017 | In: Broadsheets, Politicians, Reviews, Tabloids | Comments (2)
Murphy’s Law strikes Guido and the Daily Telegraph
Hard times at Daily Telegraph Towers. The once great newspaper that now produces tons of clickbait balls is looking to remove staff. Guido Fawkes tells his readers as much:
Yesterday the Telegraph told its staff they were planning to lay-off 20 sub-editors and farms out their work to Press Association.
Perhaps one of the ex-proofreaders can knock on Guido’s door? We all of us make mistakes, of course, but when you make it in a story about proofreading, it’s so much the better.
The error is in accordance with Murphy’s Law, aka Muphry’s Law. It states: “If you write anything criticizing editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written.”
Posted: 30th, March 2017 | In: Broadsheets, Reviews | Comment
Farage becomes the tabloids’ Great British Mascot
Nigel Farage beams from the front pages of the Daily Express and Daily Mail. Legs crossed to best display his Union flag socks-styled socks, a half-drunk pint of the warm stuff in his paw and a patriotic red, white and blue tie about his throat, Farage is politics’ answer to Ken Bailey, the man who dressed as John Bull, helped restore Erica Roe’s modesty after her Twickenham streak, and followed the Queen and the England and Bournemouth football teams across the world. Subbuteo even honoured him with his own model.
Farage is the figure who heralds the main event before vanishing from the field of play.
Including the cover, there are 6 pages given to Brexit in today’s Mail – and Farage’s one and only mention appears in the caption to that front-page photo: “Unions Jack socks: Nigele Farage in Westminster yesterday.”
And there he is again on the Express. No socks. But lots of British teeth. One page on and we do get to the socks. “Today’s the day the impossible dream came true,” says Farage sat on patio furniture. “I’m delighted.” And so too is the man dressed up as Godfrey of Bouillon across the page. Godfrey’s the bloke who led the Crusaders when they captured Jerusalem in 1099 and massacred so many Jews and Muslims, it was said, “the streets ran with blood.”
If the foreigners don’t come here to be hated by Express readers, you can always visit them.
As Farage tartily wafts his socks and waves on the main event – we suppose the UK-supporting Express would have featured a UKIP MP if such a creature existed – the opposition are notable by their absence. Not a single one of them (well, not unless you count Theresa May who wanted to remain ‘In’ the EU), is pictured in the Express. Biased, of course, but the Labour-supporting Daily Mirror also ignores Jeremy Corbyn, preferring its readers to hear from former Labour leader Gordon Brown. The paper finds space to feature an unflattering picture of Farage looking not a little gnome like. But not a sign of Corbyn.
Indeed, there is not single photo of Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the opposition, in any tabloid. There’s not even a picture of the Labour leader wearing his signature tatty vest. Just lots of Nigel Farage and his underwear.
Posted: 30th, March 2017 | In: Politicians, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment
A Holocaust Survivor’s obsessive collection of anti-Semitic propoganda
The Jew, Universal Enemy is a cartoon by Philipp Rupprecht (4 September 1900 – 4 April 1975), aka Fips. It appeared in Der Stürmer in 1937, the Nazi newspaper Rupprecht worked for from 1925-1945. The Herrenvolk liked his work very much.
hilipp Rupprecht’s poster The Jew: Universal Enemy.
In 1938, Rupprecht’s illustrations appeared in Der Giftpilz (The Poisonous Mushroom), a book for German children about vermin Jews. After the war was over, Rupprecht was sentenced to 10- year hard labor. He was released on 23 October 1950 from the prison in Eichstätt and for the rest of his life worked as a house painter in Munich and Starnberg.
Evil always was banal.
Rupprecht’s work is part of Belgian Holocaust survivor Arthur Langerman’s collection of 7,000 antisemitic objects. Langerman calls his collection an “obsession”. It features many low-marks in anti-Jewish hatred: Edouard Drumont’s publication of La France Juive; ephemera from the Dreyfus affair; drawings by Czech artist Karel Relink; graphic propaganda.
“If I donate everything to a museum, I fear they will keep them in the basement,” says Langerman. “I would prefer it to be the basis for an institute dedicated to studying and fighting antisemitism… After the war, the type of antisemitism found in my collection was a taboo. Today, it no longer is.”
Der Giftpilz
Via: The Guardian, Flashbak, Heinous Cartoons 1886-1945 is at the Caen-Normandy Memorial Museum, France, until 15 December
Ted Heath: no rest for those suspected of wickedness
9th January 1979: Edward Heath, British Conservative politician and prime minister (1970 – 1974) playing the piano to the amusement of Kermit the Frog and Paddington Bear. (Photo by Evening Standard/Getty Images)
It’s been a quiet few months for Ted Heath. Dead, of course, the former Prime Minister remains mired in allegations of sexual depravity. In today’s Mirror, the enjoyable Fleet Street Fox looks at men of Kent, of which Heath was one. Other sons of Kent’s darling, budding soil are: Nigel Farage, the former UKIP leader, and Adrian Elms, also known as Khalid Masood, the nutcase who murdered three people in a ‘loon wolf’ attack on Westminster.
In a list of rogues and reprobates born in Kent, the Fox includes Heath. The man known for his sailing, political U-turns and organ playing is billed as “suspected paedophile Ted Heath”. How’s that for a legacy? Of course, once you’re dead you can be a suspected paedophile for as long as people want to call you one. There will be no court case because the accused is dead and can’t defend himself. Justice hasn’t been denied. It’s been buried with no realistic hope of resuscitation.
In future the sane and sensible thing will be for all of us to be cryogenically frozen and, should allegations be made against us at a future date, defrosted in the white heat of a criminal trial.
Over in the Sun, news is that Heath is not to be dug up and beaten with sticks. “The £1million child abuse probe by police against former PM Ted Heath is set to be ditched,” says the paper. “Last night it was claimed the cops will close it after finding no evidence.”
Yeah, but he’s still a suspected child molester. Until you can prove he wasn’t one, the mud will stick to his bones. The paper’s next line tells us: “Detectives are investigating the former Tory leader accused of being part of a group which stabbed, tortured and maimed 16 children in churches before gorging on their blood.”
Disprove that!
Posted: 27th, March 2017 | In: Politicians, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment
Case against alleged Cornish pasty crimping Facebook ‘porn star’ collapses
When is a pastry crimper not a pasty crimper? Or to put it another way, can a porn star crimp pasties? The Daily Mail brings news of the “Cornish pasty crimper, 27” who allegedly “posed as a voluptuous 22-year-old Asian porn star”.
This would be some pose if the pasty crimper turns out to a skinny, pasty-faced bloke called Keith. Disappointingly, the alleged porn star impersonator, who, the paper reports, “met her victim on a Facebook page dedicated to introducing young ladies to wealthy older men”, is a woman. (“Ladies” not woman. “Men” not gentlemen. The Mail can be so prudish when its not gawping at woman “showing off their curves”.)
The 69-year-old alleged victim and the Cornish pie mangler never met in the flesh. We read that she allegedly “pretended to be a Bangladeshi exotic dancer” and sent her admirer a “series of steamy photos of a mystery woman, claiming to be her”.
The matter reached Truro Crown Court because over the course of a year-long relationship, the ‘porn star’ allegedly “offered to marry him if he could stump up cash for a wedding”. Reportedly the alleged scam cost him £35,000. She was charged with committing the alleged fraud and spending the money while knowing that it came from criminal conduct.
Today the case against her collapsed. We’re not sure why it did. Judge Simon Carr called in the jury and told them: “New information has come to light, which sometimes happens in cases, which has caused the Crown to consider it is not appropriate to pursue the matter further in front of you.”
Intriguing stuff.
What we do know is that the innocent woman’s husband, Jynal Khan, has already pleaded guilty to the fraud and is being dealt with in a separate court case.
What we also know is that you can work as a full-time pasty crimper.
Czech zoo chops off rhinos’ horns to deter poachers
Geography is not the Independent’s strongest suit. It tells readers today about a zoo in the Czech Republic, a country I know well. The paper says a “Prague Zoo” has been lopping off rhinos’ horns to deter poachers. The thieves sell the keratin horns to buyers in the Far East, where they are prized for
Earlier this month, poachers shot dead Vince, a 4-year-old male white rhino at France’s Thoiry Zoological Park, and removed his horn with a chainsaw.
“It’s an incredibly shocking and distressing occurrence,” said Crawford Allan, of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). “It’s also a game-changer for zoos. They’ve woken up today and realized their world has changed if they have live rhinos in their collection.” The Zoo called was understandably shocked. “Vince was found this morning by [his] caretaker, who is very attached to the animals she cares for, and is deeply affected,” the zoo stared on Facebook. “This odious act was perpetrated despite the presence of five members of the zoological staff living on the spot and surveillance cameras.”
So valued is rhino horn that people are willing to take great risk to get it. But back to the Indy, which is confusing readers and poachers by turning the Prague zoo into a moving target. It then rehashes an AP newswire report:
Prague zoo cuts off rhinos’ horns to stop poachers… Přemysl Rabas, the director of the Dvur Kralove zoo, around 70 miles north-east of the country’s capital, Prague, said it was a tough decision, but their priority was the safety of the four southern white rhinos and 17 black ones – the largest group of its kind in Europe.
It’s actually just over 80 miles from Prague. There is a zoo in Prague. But there are no rhinos there.
Fake News: Channel 4 names wrong man as Westminster Bridge terror attacker
No sooner had a lunatic murdered a policeman and two others in Westminster, London, before being shot dead by police, than the mainstream media raced to see which of them could be first to name the alleged killer.
Channel 4 news was fast from the traps. Abu Izzadeen, also known as Trevor Brooks, was allegedly named as the person responsible by Channel 4. But his lawyer says he is in prison. There’s no way it was him. Whoops!
No sooner had one news source delivered the ‘facts’ than others rehashed Channel 4’s report and without bothering to check its veracity beamed it to their audiences. The media went full Trump!
The Indy dived in, allegedly mistakenly naming the alleged killer:
Unilad spread the wrong news:
Lots more publishers joined in.
MaCleans in Canada even added a bit about the police “confirming” the alleged killer’s alleged identity. We’ve not seen police do anything of the sort.
On Twitter, voices called for circumspection, respect for the victims and to wait for the police to tell us more.
And then Channel 4 began to sweat:
No need for facts. No need for fact-checking. Has Channel 4 been hacked by the Russians? Is Sean Spicer, the White House spokesman, moonlighting as editor? Is Channel 4 discredited, indecent and dire?
Maybe.
Posted: 22nd, March 2017 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Europe’s robot sex brothel provides stiff competition for sex workers
The robots are coming! Well, not yet. But one day they will. The Daily Express says flesh and bone prostitutes have forced a mechanical sex parlour in Barcelona to shut. What the paper calls “Europe’s first sex robot brothel” is no longer open for business because women complained that the plug and play sex dolls were ruining their livelihoods.
We hear from Janet, a sex worker in city’s Raval district. “It is another strategy of the patriarchy that presents us as objects without rights or soul,” says Janet. “A privilege of the wealthy classes.”
Live cam
For those of you uncertain if you were shagging an on-the-clock polymer sex doll or an on-the-clock woman, the Express tells its readers who have been on Stag dos, rugby club dinners and business trips to the Spanish city that the the house of ill repute was at 2 Baixada de Sant Miquel “in the Spanish city’s Gothic quarter, north of the cathedral”.
“The rooms are decorated with candles,” the paper noted in a previous story, “a single glass of cava and a bowl of strawberries, with pipped music that is similar to Michael Bolton. The TV also plays pornography.”
Yeah, that one. The one that shows Keeping up with the Kardashians on loop.
Posted: 22nd, March 2017 | In: Money, Reviews | Comment (1)
Arsenal balls: Wretch ‘wraps’ with Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain
Typo of the Day arrives via the Daily Mail, wherein the paper has constructed a story from Arsenal midfielder Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain’s Instagram account. The talented but often-injured player nicknamed ‘The Ox’, presumably on account of it being a reduction in his name and not because he runs like a castrated bullock, has been passing the time with ‘wrapper Wretch 32’ as he recuperates from his umpteenth injury.
Yes. Wretch is a Wrapper. Christmas is his busiest period and in the run-up to Mothering Sunday he’s not too busy to talk about music with the Arsenal player.
The best bit about the Mail’s error is that it’ repeated over and over.
Such are the facts.
Manchester City ball: do we have any advance on 19 players getting sacked?
When Manchester City narrowly lost to Monaco in the Champions’ League, the media began to wonder which players would be looking for new jobs. Football is a brutal, nasty, venal business. Players kick a ball to the best of the abilities over a short career. The day after a match the hacks give them marks out of ’10’ and tell the failures they’d best start looking for new clubs.
In the excitement of guessing which working men will be shunted out the door, the press roll the dice. How many players are leaving Man City?
13: ‘Manchester City to axe THIRTEEN players in summer as Pep Guardiola plots squad overhaul’ (Daily Mirror).
15: ‘Skipper Vincent Kompany is set to head a potential 15-player Etihad exodus as boss Guardiola recognises his squad is not fit for purpose’ (The Sun)
17: ‘Pep Guardiola set to axe Manchester City flops with 17 players fearing for their futures ahead of clear-out’ (Daily Mail).
18: ‘Pep Guardiola set for Manchester City clearout with 18 players at risk’ (The Guardian).
19: ‘There are doubts over the futures of as many as 19 of his [Guardiola’s] existing squad
Any advance on 19?
The F-rating doesn’t give an F-word about movies
The movement towards creating explicit codes of behaviour for every aspect of life – especially the messy bits about sex – welcomes the Internet Movie Database (IMDb), which is now using the ‘F-rating’ to signal films of a feminist type. This is “so [viewers can choose films that fairly represent women on screen and behind the camera.” It is “applied to all films which are directed by women and/or written by women and/or have significant women on screen.”
That part about ‘significant women’ opens up a few issues, not least of all when it comes to grot movies, especially the girl-on-girl sort. The F-rating might not be the best guide to family entertainment or indeed anything approaching entertainment of any strain. But, then, the F-rating is not about films; it’s about educating the masses and turning people – wonderfully complex humans – into quotas. The official F-rated website explains the vision:
‘The stories we see on screen need to be told by a broad spectrum of people to represent our diverse culture. Without change, we will train the next generation to only recognise white males as the protagonists and the ones in control of the cameras, scripts and budgets. As well as equality on screen and behind the camera, more female film critics from diverse backgrounds and ethnicities need to be welcomed into the industry so that opinion and feedback is balanced.’
It’s certainly not about viewers, many of whom are women. It’s about gender. The thinking is that female film fans go to the cinema not to seek escapism but to reaffirm their identity. You’re not watching them; you’re looking at yourself. But you’ve already got free use of Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook to gawp at idealised filmic versions of yourself, so why spend good money on watching a narcissistic film?
Note 1: If equality is the mantra, then the IMDb could look at itself. According to Wikipedia, the IMDb ‘originated with a Usenet posting by British film fan and computer programmer Col Needham entitled “Those Eyes”, about actresses with beautiful eyes.’ Col is a white male – and since he flogged the site to Amazon, a very rich one.
Note 2: Amazon is owned by Jeff Bezos, a rich white male. Amazon Inc. has 7 ‘Officers’. All are white. One is a woman. Amazon has 11 directors – 9 of whom are male. Should businesses get an F-rating, too – and if so would the IMDb warrant one?
Posted: 15th, March 2017 | In: Film, Money, Reviews | Comment
Powerwashing with Tourettes Syndrome
Powerwashing with Tourettes features Lewis Qball Nickell washing his garden patio. “Decided to do a video on just what Tourette’s syndrome really is,” says Lewis. “Let’s continue spreading awareness together! Oh and it was so much effort being serious this entire video.”
In another video, Lewis plays golf:
Follow Lewis on twitter.
Woman accused of raping a man was born a man
Hear the one about the woman accused of raping a man – twice? The Indy delivers the facts in headline and teaser: ‘Woman appears in court charged with raping man twice – Newcastle woman will face four-day trial in December.’
Rape, as defined in English law, is:
Rape.
The elements of rape are:
(A) intentionally penetrates the vagina, anus or mouth of another person (B) with his penis;
(B) does not consent to the penetration, and
(A) does not reasonably believe that (B) consents
Penetration of the mouth is included.
The story of the woman accused of rape is, thus, an unusual one. The accused is named as Katie Brannen. Katie appeared at Newcastle Crown Court ‘accused of two offences of rape after allegedly attacking the man in January in South Shields’.
In all reports Katie is described as a woman, and self-identifies as such. The interesting part is that Katie has a penis. Katie is out on bail. Katie is banned from contacting the alleged victim and from all licensed premises.
Rachel Johnson tells Mail readers that Brannen was born male. Johnson says that this fact was ‘omitted in the moral panic around both privacy and misgendering, the progressive cause de nos jours. To call someone by the wrong title is considered verbal assault and even bigotry.’ This self-censorship has led to what Johnson calls a ‘fake fact – that women can and do rape men – rather than telling us the literal truth.’
It leads to all manner of questions. Is this a case of misattributed pronouns? Should we stick to gender-neutral language? Has liberation become censorship? How does this impact on the world beyond words – do we have gender-neutral prisons? To what extent can simple biological fact be altered? Is gender located not in culture, biology or society but in performance?
Transgender people should be free to identify however they choose but what about the rest of us? It’s confusing, no?
Posted: 12th, March 2017 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Tinder Select is quarantine for every syphilis-sacked SADO
The VIP entrance
Good news, shaggers. As you swipe left and right, chances are thinner than Donald Trump’s skin you’ll encounter a Hooray Henrietta, Premier League footballer, third-world despot or SADO (sons and daughters of…) because there’s a secret breeding stables called Tinder Select.
This is where the inbreds and syphilis sufferers in the celebrity Petri dish get quarantined, leaving functioning people for the rest of us to squire.
I’d imagine Tinder Select operates bit like the mobile toilets on a Hollywood film set or the broom cupboard in a London eatery, where dynasty-building nepotists and narcissists grab a life affirming knee-trembler.
You mustn’t feel jealous of the Tinder select crowd. They’ve been out in their place to spare the rest of us.
Spotter: Engadget
Posted: 9th, March 2017 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
TSA expects more sexual assault claims from its new pat-down search technique
To enter America, you might need to let America enter you. If the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) thinks that you’re suspicious, you get the pat down. Your genitals are cupped, your anus is probed and your breasts undergo a vigorous investigation. And it’s getting more invasive. Now TSA offices have been advised to tell police to expect more accusations of sexual assault from holidaymakers and other travellers.
The TSA’s new standardised pat-down is more “comprehensive”, says Bloomberg. Right now, the TSA tells uniformed frotters:
TSA officers use the back of the hands for pat-downs over sensitive areas of the body. In limited cases, additional screening involving a sensitive area pat-down with the front of the hand may be needed to determine that a threat does not exist.
The front hand will now be used more frequently.
“I would say people who in the past would have gotten a pat-down that wasn’t involved will notice that the [new] pat-down is more involved,” TSA spokesman Bruce Anderson said Friday. The shift from the previous, risk-based assessment on which pat-down procedure an officer should apply was phased in over the past two weeks after tests at smaller airports, he said.
The TSA screens about 2 million people daily at U.S. airports. The agency doesn’t track how many passengers are subject to pat-down searches after they pass through an imaging scanner. People who decline to use this screening technology are automatically subject to physical searches.
While passengers may find the process more intrusive, the new screening procedure isn’t expected to increase overall airport security delays. However, “for the person who gets the pat down, it will slow them down,” Anderson said.
Especially if they have trouble walking afterwards.
Spotter: Consumerist
Posted: 8th, March 2017 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
Jimmy Savile’s sex-free sex den at High Royds Hospital
Fancy a peek inside ‘Jimmy Savile’s sex den’? This is where the ‘shamed star preyed on victims’. The Daily Star’s wrong, of course. Savile wasn’t shamed. Sir Jimmy was buried with full honours. The great and good lined up to praise the “colourful character”, the embodiment of “diligence and decency” who will be “greatly missed“. Savile was not shamed. He was dug up, possibly beaten with sticks and buried a good deal deeper down than the normal six feet, but the Papal knight died a State- approved hero.
Savile’s ‘sex den’ is the abandoned High Royds Hospital in Menston, West Yorkshire. Savile was a depraved, gibbering loon who hid in plain sight. He didn’t need a sex den. He had a caravan, a BBC studio pass and an NHS-issued gown.
Reading on we learn that the sex den featured no actual sex. The Star reports:
It was here sexual predator Savile targeted a number of women during the get-together in 1988. The party was to celebrate the centenary of the hospital, according to a 2014 report.
More of an office party than a sex den, then?
An investigation found that the monster had cupped women’s boobs and put his hand up one victim’s skirt during the event.
All nasty, pervy, leery, criminal and sad. But not what anyone would call a sex den, least of all the Star, whose Television X stablemate broadcasts hardcore pornography with such titles as Sexual Predator 1.
As for Savile, well, the Star continues: ‘But the women didn’t make a formal complaint because sexual assault was considered an “occupational hazard”, the report said.’
Maybe that should be investigated – why nurses were seen as fair game?
Over in the Mirror, the sex den is gone. We are in the former hospital ‘where Jimmy Savile groped nurses and asked for a room in case he “pulled”‘. We see photographs by Kieran Young, 20, who posts as Exploring Lancashire.
“I had been here a few times previous but never found a way in,” he says. “I’ve always love the look of Victorian buildings so this really took my eye so I kept going back to get in. After five or six attempts I finally got in with a friend. My pictures encapsulate the past while also showing the morbid reality of the present.”
They’re good. We like looking over disused building, which given their massive size and emptiness often look haunting and sinister. Was Savile the worst thing to have occurred at West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum, later Menston Mental Hospital and finally High Royds Psychiatric Hospital, where up to the 1960s inmates were buried in unmarked graves? Who listened to the poor and vulnerable back then? Who listens to them now?
A staff member is quoted talking about Savile in 2014: “He was just very free with his hands, so hands going round people, round their waist but then upwards, cupping under breasts, hands up the skirt. We just laughed it off, said ‘Dirty old man’ and didn’t go near him for the rest of the day. I can’t imagine that if we had said anything to anybody, or the police, that anybody would take it seriously, I don’t think, at that time. It was just an occupational hazard of being a woman.”
It sounds like Savile wasn’t the only man free with his hands. But he’s the focus of the Mail’s report, even if the paper does spell his name wrong.
The Mail issues an invitation: ‘Look inside an abandoned psychiatric hospital with a truly dark past: Jimmy Saville [sic] once prowled these corridors to launch sickening attacks on nurses.’
He more walked and jogged than prowled. That was the thing with Jimmy Savile – he was there for all to see, often dressed in a shining gold tracksuit and neon hair. He was hard to miss. But no-one was listening.
Posted: 26th, February 2017 | In: Key Posts, News, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment
Bad PR: Helen Bailey’s killer is an Arsenal fan
Unwelcome endorsements: a look at brands being associated with negative news.
After Ian Stewart murdered his lover Helen Bailey and plotted to steal her fortune, he lied and lied to make the police believe his innocence. He also, as the Times notes, ‘spent her money on Arsenal tickets’.
More bad PR when we see it.
Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho laments sacking of Claudio Ranieri – the man he called old and useless
How did Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho respond to news that Leicester City have sacked Claudio Ranieri, the man who just nine months ago led the Foxes to the Premier League title? Mourinho was keen to show his support for the defenestrated manager.
Not so very long ago Mourinho was deriding Ranieri as a thick, useless coffin dodger:
Transcript:
I am very demanding of myself and I have to win to be sure of things,” he said. “This is why I have won so many trophies in my career. Ranieri on the other hand has the mentality of someone who doesn’t need to win.
“He is almost 70 years old. He has won a Super Cup and another small trophy and he is too old to change his mentality. He’s old and he hasn’t won anything. I studied Italian five hours a day for many months to ensure I could communicate with the players, media and fans. Ranieri had been in England for five years and still struggled to say ‘good morning’ and ‘good afternoon’.”
At least Jose Mourinho’s consistent in one thing: it’s always all about him.
