I'm addicted!

I should be working but I'm addicted to that:

http://tabloid-watch.blogspot.com/

The best blog I've ever read in my life! That's all I love: good work on how low the pathetic tabloids get everyday when it comes to doing so-called journalism.

A few extracts if I may:

The Daily Express doesn't believe in climate change. This front page from last week made that clear. The quote marks around fraud show it is a quote from someone else but the phrasing makes it clear the, ahem, 'world's greatest newspaper' is of the same mind.

That was emphasised again on Tuesday 8 December when their Environment Editor's feeble article about Copenhagen was given the headline A load of hot air!

That's their exclamation mark, not mine.

And the sub-head was 'Climate change talks are £130m waste of time'.

£130m? Guess where that figure came from.

Yes, the TaxPayers' Alliance. Who else? It's not entirely clear what use this figure is, or even if it is very accurate. For example, all their calculations assume every one of the 15,000 delegates stays for the whole eleven days.

Also, they have allocated around £54 million to the salaries of delegates (the wages they are being paid from their job, over the eleven days of the conference) based on a median wage of £72,713. With enviable accuracy, they say:

While many delegates will be paid less than £72,713, many political, civil service and business leaders will be paid much more.

Glad that's clear then.

The Express has a graphic of figures 'relevant' to Copenhagen: 15,000 delegates, 5,000 journalists, 140 private jets, 1,200 limos and so on. It includes five figures from the TPA's report as if they are fact.

And also - just to show how serious the paper is about the subject - the really crucial number in the climate change debate:

1,400 prostitutes offering free sex to conference pass holders.

But the £130m is what the Express leads with, although they don't attribute the figure to the TPA, or even - shock! - quote them in the article.

That's even more miraculous given the third paragraph:

Critics claim the conference of 192 countries, costing £130million, is a “waste of time”.

As the article rumbles on, you wonder: who are these critics? Who are these climate change experts branding Copenhagen a:

summit of hot air.

Not the TPA but...the Association of British Drivers.

Yes, that world-renowned authority on climate change.


The news that around 100 Romanians have been forced to flee their homes in Belfast because of a string of racist attacks is a shocking and important development. At time of writing it is lead story on the BBC website, and takes a high profile on the Sky News, Guardian, Telegraph and Times websites (various below Iran and breaking unemployment figures).

The Sun's homepage doesn't mention it anywhere on it's homepage (but Big Brother is everywhere). The Express has it on it's UK news page, but not the homepage.

The Mail does have it fairly high up, but decides it's of less importance than more whinging about bin collections, job applications at McDonalds, why Brits like living in New Zealand (one of their twisted 'immigration is good when it's British people' stories), Katie Price's big tits and Victoria Beckham's reduced tits.

And when you get to the comments section on the Mail's story, it's beyond parody. This comment:

I notice a lot of blaming the victim going on here. Racism is disgusting and always wrong. Anyone who voted BNP recently take a look - this is the future you voted for.
- JamesP., edinburgh, 17/6/2009 9:41

is currently at -121. And at -102, this:

it is very easy to whip up hysteria about immigration but its equally hard to control the nasty forces such hysteria unleashes. We all have a responsibility here.....
- Mike, Bristol, 17/6/2009 9:26

Whereas commentators who blame the government, rather than the mindless racist thugs, get big positive scores. But Mike in Bristol's comment about immigration hysteria unleashing nasty forces - you can't expect Mail readers to appreciate that.


After calling a previous Big Brother contestant a 'fruit', the Star proves it's homophobia once again with the nonsensical headline BB on massive bender. Which might be allowable if it was a reference to endless drinking. But it's not, it's about the various lesbian and bisexual contestants, particularly Freddie,

'a sleazy toff who once ran a GAY SEX website'.

It goes on:

Sleazy Freddie...an entrepreneur who once set up a sordid gay escort website...The x-rated uniboys.co.uk, promised to connect pervy individuals with £120-an-hour escorts. Services offered included “domination, fetish and role play”. Freddie, 23, and a pal were both advertised as escorts on the website, which is now closed down.

So not only is he a 'bender,' he's 'sleazy' and 'sordid'. Gay sex is so appalling to the Star it has to be highlighted in caps. Given that the paper is owned by someone who runs a collection of porn TV channels - which probably have plenty of girl-on-girl programming - it seems highly hypocritical.

And of course the Star would never encourage such 'pervy' behaviour.

Except, umm, it does.

In the 'Classified' section of the Daily Star website, you can see ads with titles such as 'Bend me over and spank my bum', 'Genuine Submissive Services', 'Thai girl massage' and 'London submissive girls'. And that's just on the first few of the 160 pages of 'service' ads.

Daily Star: homophobic hypocrites.