I'm sorry for anyone who actually works for the 4th Estate. I'm sure lots of perfectly decent people work really hard for them to make a living. However, the revolting syrup that gets served up (presumably aimed at what all the market research tells them is the typical reader/viewer, i.e. reduced to the lowest common denominator) daily makes me puke.

Where's the hysterical appeals to have Swansea and Rotherham hoyed out of the League? I'm sorry, weren't their fans foreign enough to make them easy targets to stir up hatred and make them public enemy number one? I'm sure if you dig deep enough you can prove that some of them ate kebabs and that this is what started them throwing bricks into areas holding families who had foolishly come along to watch an end-of-season title-decider.

How's about trying to inform people about sports they may be interested in? After all, the BBC and Sky Sports news teams enjoy a healthy budget and presumably employ people with an interest in sport. Why then did both these crews spend this morning sniggering about Schumacher's experiences in the Spanish Grand Prix and make out it was all his fault? Did they watch this race? Are they claiming that when the lollipop man tells the driver to go he should first get out of his car and have a walk around to make sure everyone is really out of the way or should he do what the man who is paid to make that decision tells him to? W*nkers!

Perhaps tomorrow when the fact that Ferrari's head mechanic who was hurt in the incident is British has percolated through to them they will put on serious faces and speak in hushed tones. All weekend they whispered about brave David Coulthard driving in the race after narrowly escaping death in a plane crash during the week. Is it really so difficult for them to work out what would have happened had that refueling rig's hose ruptured when Michael drove away if the Head Mechanic hadn't put his own safety at risk to pull it clear as he drove off? Perhaps a few hundred litres of flaming fuel spraying down the pit lane would have been even more amusing and we could have all had a jolly good laugh as the Hapless Hun set fire to all the mechanics or torched the grandstand. Ha ha ha!

Zero integrity. It's what you expect when your supposed information services are designed to serve commercial needs. Less and less interest in the truth, more and more sensationalism and the few brief strands of difficult or unpalatable information being pushed further and further away from important time-slots.

Kids TV long ago ceased to be interested in information and replaced it with gunge - God knows why, it's never been funny - and the more channels we get the less new programmes are made. It's formulaic sh*t endlessly repeating the same tired plots and jokes. If you want to see the future then just watch Football Fever: a pair of morons constantly going 'Whooo!', a continuous dance track in the background in case football isn't able to hold people's attention and a mass of invasive digital effects to make up for having no idea hwat they are trying to say. Truly frightening.

Not sure what's to be done about it, but one thing's for sure, they'll be first against the wall when the revolution comes.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Answers

Nice dialtribe Softie. Nowt gets the blood pumping better than some bloke getting somethin' of his chest. I happen to agree the large proportion of your 'address'. I worked in the Chronicle Circulation dept and saw the nonsense of Newspapers. All this guardians of democracy is a historical & hypothetical anomoli and stands for didly squit if the tabloid nonsense and serious news is in the same boat, which it cannot not be as you are then into variables of style.

The big prize for journo's is the storey, not the facts. I was once doing a piece for a student rag (which is just the thing for budding journo's)about the impending closure of the Border history museum down Hexham way. It all sniffed of county hall cuts and Tory disregard for local culture etc etc. But when I got down to it, all the folks that were (pre written you see in my head) to cast as the villains were working their preverbials off trying to keep the thing open. Even the Dukes piper was involved with his grace's permission of course! The storey at the end of the day was too complex to do properly and would have screwed some people if I twisted it which I couldn't do.

At the end of the point though Softie, it is a sad indictment of our sad existances that we buy it or listen to it. Even the hallowed BBC six O'clock news will put a slant on something t make it appear 'more interesting', presmably because we can't cope with the fact that the real storey is probably rather boring. It all becomes merely gossip in the end......

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Hahaha. I can smell the venom Softie. Strangely though, you must have considered employment in a related field yourself. If not, you should do - I'd far rather read some of the stuff people post here (yourself included) than some of the stuff a pay to read on the tube in the morning.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Agree Softie , but you see i think you're delving a little bit deeper here than the journo or the rag its printed in . the isolated incidents are easily identified and the public easily led . I had a chat with a friend on Saturday who was STILL convinced Al shouldnt be automatic choice for England , until i reminded him of goals scored . You se there' a typical piece of sensationalism this weekend with refernce to the Warehouseman's 30 goals .. ill bet bottam dollar the debate will rage from the Media sluts that it should be who will Partner phillips and not Shearer . Sorry i digress . the point i was initially trying to make was that sensationalism is bred from the world we live in and the 'system' ( diplomatic or not ) that this country works on . We are a direct offshoot of the succesful (apparently ) American civilisation . I wont wage a war of politics here ; though im right in the mood for itbut simply say the press provide what the crowd desire and then sensationalise without fear of reprisal for the individual . The problem i who does the buck really lie with - top man at the paper , government or the journo ... or us ? Personally colonic cancer is too curable in my eyes , sorry if you get my drift .

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

I'll never turn to the Dark Side...what are the hours like? :-)

Seriously, though, Sky News now encourage Joe Bloggs to e-mail them with their opinions on the day's news, and they actually READ THEM OUT. Eh? Has the world gone mad? We trim down the stories to their simplest form to make time for some member of the public to let you know what he thinks- which probably isn't very much since to have the chance to comment he's been denied most of the facts on which to base his opinion in the first place. Is this meant to be an information service?

The thing is that I fully recognise in myself the inevitable slide towards being Victor Meldrew (or even Pit Bill) some day, but I really can see a drop in standards right accross the board. Every day I put myself through the same ghastly ritual. I wake to the Radio 5 headlines at 6.00am and then go downstairs for coffee and toast and Marmite along with feeding the cat. I settle down, masticating my Marmite through clenched teeth (no mean feat), coffee mug grasped in white-knuckled fist, cat hiding behind sofa as I wait for John Desborough's inarticulate appearance on Sky News for the Sport section at 6.19am. There follows the usual moronic run through of rumours, baias, half-truths and guesses as to what tomorrow's stories will be (forget getting yesterday right, that's way passed its sell-by date!). This is always accompanied by my shouting abuse at him, "WHICH United, you c***!", "CoulTHard, you ignorant w*nker, it's pronounced exactly how its spelt!"

Eventually, weak and shaking from the healthy mixture of rage and caffeine first thing in the morning, I switch over to BBC for the 6.32am Sport Section with Rob Bonnett and go through it all again. ITV don't even pretend to report on what's going on so at least they aren't deluding themselves, whilst Channel 5 upset me so badly that I eventually had to stop watching it altogether. They didn't even ask Joe Public for opinions, they let the bloody anchorman give his version of events. Johnny Gould I will hunt you down one day!

The real problem is that this drivel costs a fortune to put out, an absolute bloody fortune, and it's 90% sh*t. I know something about football, I've seen a lot of the games they're talking about and it's plainly and simply inaccurate (a nice way of putting it). So what does this say about the general news coverage? God knows you have to put up with some ill-informed drivel from taxi-drivers and 606 callers who depend entirely on the media for their opinions on football, but we all trust these ignoramouses to provide us with our World View. If it's even half as badly put together and misinformed as the crap they churn out for Sports News then I really fear for the mental health of the nation.

The treatment accorded to bits of the World I have experienced first hand leave me open-mouthed with disbelief. What right do the Newsrooms have to moralize the way they do and try to compartmentalise every situation into Goodies and Baddies? Watching them dance a horn-pipe over Zimbabwe where they are having such trouble coming up with a new formula since blacks=goodies and whites=baddies unsurprisingly doesn't cover all the bases anymore. They are now trying to find ways of compartmentalising it all so that they don't have to change anything. Now it is ordinary blacks and decent white farmers=goodies, squatters (War Veterans suggests honourable people so we'll change the terminology)=baddies, and hey, let's say that Mugabe is 'Just like Hitler', that's always worked in the past. Numbheads! It's never been that simple.

My own biggest rant against the telly last week was when they got all po-faced about Gadaffi's claim that he wanted to see justice done to the Lockerbie bombers, and one of these newsreaders suggested that he should have thought of that before helping terrorists to kill civillians. Now excuse me, but was that my imagination or did we not help Reagan launch a massive air raid on Triploi in 1984/5 to try to wipe Gadaffi out? Don't remember much compassion for civillians caught in the crossfire of real-politik then, do you?

Anyway, I shall subside muttering to myself and nurse the bile until the 6 o'clock 'News' tonight, but you have to admit, it's a shocking state of affairs.

p.s. Don't even get me started on the Weather Forecast!;-)

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Crikey. Toon get a boring end-of-season draw away at Pride Park and Softie does his nut in. What's it gonna be like in the summer when there's nee Toon footy at aal? Thank God he'll have his mind on other things - like nappy changing, vomit and the like!

Otherwise, a well-worthwhile read Mr Southerner. I hope you feel better now.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Well......that's me knackered then Softie?

:0(

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

......am I off your Xmas card list then? ;0(

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Softie,
Lump the advertising 'industry' in with that lot. It's our own fault though - it's a bit like whingeing each time the price of beer goes up, but we contine to drink it. The problem, I think, is that a large proportion of us is such a brainless, ignorant, easily pleased, non-discriminating bunch of scum bags, that to have the temerity to introduce media blatantly aimed at anybody with a modicum of intelligence would be howled down as rank elitism.

I cringe at the antics sometimes. It even looks as if the best thing that could happen to good old hom sap would be a very sudden and drastic reduction in population to about 0.001 percent of the current level, but doctored so that the survivors would only be people of whom we approved -)

I shall now retire to my Anderson shelter until the flak disperses.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Great idea Pit Bill, glad to see you are a moderate like mesell.

One problem though, do you think they would let us choose?

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

At least you get t*ts in the tabloids. The broadsheets and TV News programmes don't even offer that.

But perhaps therein lies the problem. The British male (majoritively speaking) would rather ogle a scantily clad female over the breakfast table than read accurate news reporting. Whether it's chicken or egg (no, I'm not still on aboot the breakfast) I dunno. As Pit says, most of those who buy the papers, (and indeed watch the news snippets) are incapable of digesting more detailed reporting.

You'd think (OK - no you wouldn't) that a programme dedicated to news, 24hs a day might make a bit more effort. But no - they too must bow down to the advertising and "populist" views.

Give me the BBS anytime. (No ITK, that was not a spilling mistook).

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

ITK, of course not! It's the product that disgusts me, not the workers. I spent 3 years working as a labourer for a firm that specialised in barn-conversions. The first one we built was an utter disaster. Loads of enthusiasm, not enough know-how or experience. The next 3 were magnificent and I still take people to see them when I'm in that neck of the woods (although the owners wrinkle their noses and turf me off as a trespasser - bloody cheek, it'd still be a rotten pile of lumber without my sweat and blood!).

Anyway, you couldn't meet a nicer bunch of blokes; witty, compassionate, endlessly laughing and joking and hard working. However, once the boom bust (if you follow me) in 1989/90, things got tight and we had to cut lots of corners and compete with one another for what work was available. I'm not proud of the jobs we did then. I don't blame the fellas I was working with, I know why we skimped on the cement when laying the york stone floor. I know why the flags were split down to slivers in order to go further instead of remaining 2 or 3 inches thick. I even know why all the floorboards creak and all the windows open to the left. Doesn't make it alright, but the people aren't to blame.

Sorry if I caused offence. None intended. What's the inside view like? I'm beginning to think it's all just designed to upset me. MotD remains an excellent method of disseminating football (although I don't always agree with the choice of 'experts' or on which bits of action make the edit) but when I'm watching the News I expect to hear what has happened, not what they think will happen in the next couple of days. When George Graham goes into hospital that is the whole story right there, I don't give a flying f**k whether Trevor Stevens thinks they might change the manager at WHL over the Summer, that isn't news, it's opinion, and they would do well to stop blurring the boundaries.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

While we are on the subject, I HATE sitting down to watch the news, then after say the first or second headline story they go to some "here is a survey on are generic goods better value than brand names" CRAP. I want to watch NEWS not some info-bloody-mercial rubbish. Put all this sort of drivel on a show after the news and see how it rates.

Oh and why do we need two news readers? Sorry "presenters"? Is a full twenty minutes too much for one? (Take out headlines, sport and weather) Will the stress of being on their own in front of the camera shorten their lives? or is it just plain overwork to let one do it?

I do like the little animal bits at the end though.

Disgusted,

Perth Australia.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Tee hee! Even worse than having co-presenters is that one of them can usually be heard clacking away on a keyboard while the other one is talking. Get up earlier and prepare the work before you go on air you lazy hounds!

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Either that or they take away the background to show everyone that there are loads of people working in the newsroom!!! And the amount of money they get paid for half an hour a day. Most of them are clearly not clever enough to write what they read cause they cannot pronounce half of it.

I reckon that they are on a BBS or sumat. They just do it to show everyone they can use a computer. If we could read it probably only Rik and Dodjy Spleer could understand it!!

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Gus,
I could be way off, but I seem to remember from years ago that Dutch tv would show programs until late at night and then run tons and tons of adverts, so if we must have commercial tv, that's the way it should be done.

Ninety nine percent of ads would make my blood boil if I could bear to watch them, so compound this with Softie's point about the standard of news reporting, which applies to tv journalism as well, and the standard of other tv offerings, and there appears to be a strong case for me emigrating to Alaska or the Outback or somewhere equally remote.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Think you've got problems ?

Come and live in Hong Kong !!

val.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Well if this is the goat getting thread, then what really get's mine is the labelling of things as 'official'. Sorta ties in with Softie's gripe, in that it assumes the mindless public will blindly accept an opinion because someone says it's 'official'. An example recently, some awards ceremony, the compere's going on about Diana Ross having being voted best Diva or something of the decade, and then says that 'we' are going to go one better than that, 'we' have 'officially' named Diana Ross as best female singer bla bla of the Millennium, with big emphasis on the official. What? What the f@ck does official mean in this context? I can just see this 'fact' being reproduced around various media, again using the label 'official' so people don't query what is really only a tenuous opinion linked inextricably with marketing hype. I know with this situation nobody could care either way, but it's representative of an attitude - the attitude that the general public should unthinkingly swallow the opinions of the various media and regurgitate them as if gospel truths. Well, that's my official opinion anyway.

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

If British newscasts really are following the American model, you can look forward to news sets that look like chat show sets. I was most distressed to turn on the least offensive(that's not saying much) local news channel a couple of weeks ago to be faced with something that looked like Late Night with David letterman(but without the humour and band). It was the day of the marathon, so I figured it was a one-off. Ha! It's still there. :-/

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

I feel I should throw my two penneth in here as I belong to that sector commonly known as 'scum' i.e. journalists.

Now before you guys start throwing the insults I'll point out that I don't actually do news at the moment but have done in the past, in a trade only capacity. Furthermore, from this side I have experienced enough to wholeheartedly agree with you on many of the points brought up.

Journo's are lazy, well quite a few are anyway. But considering the pittance they are offered in the IT industry, and most probably elsewhere there is very little to motivate you further. Also as more people use the internet to get their news, the pressure to deliver copy quickly often leaves very little time for a full check on the facts. What seems like a simple job to do a bit of in-depth investigation (and in essence insn't too difficult) just isn't possible in may cases due to time constraints.

Apart from that you've got pressures coming from editors and publishers. Publishers have a very different perception of what is independent journalism and not selling out to advertisers than reporters.

Editors present other issues. A friend of mine who works on a trade- only networking weekly told me yesterday that his editor pointed out on deadline day that there was no story on any of the major network companies in the first few pages of the book. Consequently one lucky journo was forced to go and basically invent a story on one of these companies to satisfy said editor.

I'm not sure where this is exactly going or what relevance it has to the daily rags, but the whole system seems a bit corrupt to me. Like the old cliche says, the first casualty of war is truth, and this seems to be quite apt in the ratings and readership battles between the big media players.

Meandering diatribe over, back to work (well not really, I'm a journalist after all).

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Fascinating stuff Baxter, I really wish I could be suitably shocked to hear that stories are made up to suit clients at the whim of less than scrupulous editors, but sadly, I'm not. :-)

Sorry about the strong title, but at least it got a bit more action on here than we've had of late. The most depressing thing is going off on one and not being pulled up for exaggerating...it's a pretty damning indictment when a rant from a clearly unbalanced individual is greeted with nods of approval (gulp!).

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000

Wow Softie! You must be feeling better after that! Haven`t heard such a good rant on here in a long time! Mind you, you`ve made me feel tons better - nice to know that I`m not the only one who is regularly left standing open mouthed at some news report or other. I thought I was turning into a sad old misery-guts, constantly feeling the urge to `write` and complain! (Never do though, because I felt that was just giving written confirmation that I am turning into the female version of Victor Mildrew!)

Can`t see it changing - but at least you know you are not alone in your frustration. (:o)

-- Anonymous, May 08, 2000