For too long in our society we have concealed a dark evil. A scurrilous money grubbing press that panders to the lowest common denominator and attempts to lower it still further. A press which treats women as sex objects until some hapless male uses one as such when he will then be the subject of public humiliation in the holier-than-thou newspaper concerned. A press which often has little to say and so pads out the space with inane stories about soaps and their "stars". Newspapers which are put together by manipulative people working for their bosses own political and business agenda, who are entirely uninterested in truth. Newspapers read by people with an IQ somewhere in the region of 200. (I mean the entire readership added together).

Now in this august forum of the BBS, the very last thing I would want to do is to encourage an attitude of vigilantism. I don't want to see hoardes of angry people stopping buying these papers or worse still storming their offices to drive out the evil scum from our midst. However, I believe that we should all know who these people are so that we can keep ourselves and our families safe from harm and so I chose to reluctantly name the guilty scum here.

I name the News of the World.

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

Answers

Hear hear! I'll definitely not be buying that or any other rag of a newspaper...boycott them all, hang the staff, castrate the editors and feed the owners their own testicles!

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

Jonno

As a concerned citizen I think you owe it to the nation to publish the address of this "newspaper". And if you don't, I will be forced to start a campaign to name and shame you, and demand legislation so that it every blerk called Jonno has their vital statistics available for scrutiny by the BBS...

I'd call it 'Bobby's Law'.

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

It was funny to see that a pressure group named and shamed the editor of the NotW who has since received death threats from paedophile organizations and has had to go into protective custody. The crosses we make for ourselves, eh?

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

keep your eyes peeled for the next time anyone attacks the press. They are summarily ripped to shreds in the press and even on the radio. All this B*ll*cks abpout being the guardians of democracy is utter garbage and has about the same validity as the National Rifle association saying they are upholding the American constitution by having a small arsenal in their potting shed. (what did happen to Diego's letters home?) As a poud liberal I would normally warn against the power of the press being curtailed, but I am more and more becoming in favour of it and as such can only add that they are making a rod for their ownb backs here and sooner or later it will happen...I detest the rag with a real fervour ( I would go on a protest even!!! .

NotW...Booo hissss!!!

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

I know it is an awful thing to say - and I expect to be shot down for this - but parents of children killed etc can sometimes appear to be almost relishing the limelight.

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

Beardo

Bit harsh, but I see what you're getting at. Sarah Payne's parents have been thrust under the media spotlight at a time of great stress and personal trauma. Most people who have recently suffered bereavement do not want to be involved in anything but getting through their grief. The Paynes, IMHO, are being manipulated at a time when they would be better advised to be with family and friends.

I'm a bit sick of seeing widows, orphans and bereaved parents being stuck in front of the cameras and TV to satisfy some warped kind of schadenfreude. This happened with Diana Windsor, that Colonel in Greece and now the Paynes. What ever happened to private mourning?

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

The Colonel in Grease? Was he the bloke in the other car??? ;-))

I'll get me wellies.

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

Bobby

A better point than mine. Yes - it is that they are being manipulated by the media. Everyone has their own way of overcoming bereavement and some want to feel they are doing something about it. The papers are trying to sell copies on the back of it - disgusting.

Beardo

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

Interestingly, the great Russ Gallagher, editor of NUFC-The Truth said in his pre-season resport in MOTD magazine that NOTW are enemy number no 1 at NUFC for taking a perverse interest in the club's affairs. He is dead against SOS and, I think, wrote an editorial about their accepting help from NOTW with their court action.

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

On a journo/newspaper related topic, check out this scandal mongering from a few years back, courtesy of 'The Scallywag'

Selling Out The Pensioners For Newcastle F.C.

Three years ago Newcastle United was a club in trouble, facing relegation to the third division for the first time in the club's history and with debts of #6 million.

Today the team sits at the top of the premier league and every game is guaranteed to be sold out.

Much has been written about the turn around in the club's fortunes and the Chairman, Sir John Hall and Kevin Keegan, the manager, are widely perceived as being the club's saviours.

Unusually, however, the press have been less enthusiastic about recounting their own part in this transformation.

In the late 1990's Sir John Hall launched a take-over bid for the club. The bid was strenuously contested by the existing board and all the news of the battle was closely watched by the fans in the sports pages in the local paper, the Evenning Chronicle.

For reasons known only to himself, the sports editor, John Gibson, decided that the paper should not be impartial on the issue and in what was described by one reader as "the most disgraceful piece of journalism ever witnessed" brought the paper down firmly on the side of the Magpie Group led by John Hall who through his company Cameron Hall developments already had a #50,000 a year sponsorship deal with nearby Gateshead F.C.

As the fight for the control of the club hardened, so the price the parties were willing to pay for shares increased.

Pensions For Power

In what was the most novel use for a pension fund. John Hall admitted to paying #10,000 for a #1 share, using money from the Cameron Hall Pension Fund. In all, Hall admitted to using #1 million of pension fund money in his fight for power.

At the time newspapers were full of stories about abuse of pension funds by Robert Maxwell but no-one ever questioned the morality of using the Cameron Hall Pension Fund in this way. Instead the Chronicle continued in it's unswerving loyalty to Sir John Hall.

When the inevitable finally occurred and the take-over was achieved, Hall turned his attention to nearby Gateshead Football Club.

Gateshead F.C. play at the Gateshead International Stadium, owned by the local Council. In 1994 the Council had bailed the club out of it's troubles by purchasing the shareholding for #40,000.

In September 1991 Alex Cuscani, the Chairman of Gateshead F.C. hosted a lunch for Sir John Hall's son Douglas, John Gibson and Paul Steven's, the director of Recruitment Department.

Money-Go-Round

a few days after the lunch Stevens sold 40,000 shares in Gateshead F.C to Sports editor John Gibson, who then became a director of the club.

The price of the shares was #11,000, which certainly does not show sound business sense on behalf of Stevens, the Council having paid #40,000 when buying.

Gibson has consistently refused to explain where he got #11,000 from and it is widely recognised that this is his reward from the Hall family for his part in their successful take-over at Newcastle.

The following month Gibson Gave Alex Cuscani a cheque for #5,000 to buy another 2,000 shares in Gateshead F.C. Cuscani is adamant that his money came from the Halls.

Shortly after this in a move reminiscent of the Newcastle take- over, Cuscani was removed from the board and John Gibson became Chairman of Derby County and his son as Chairman of Oxford United.

Maxwell had tried to introduce ground sharing to Oxford with nearby Reading, a move which met considerable opposition from both camps.

Similarities between the two families were further heightened when Sir John Hall announced that he was in favour of ground sharing and that he proposed that Newcastle United should play their games at the Gateshead International Stadium, where just by coincidence John Gibson was Chairman and his son Douglas, Director.

This particular, he stood no chance of winning as Newcastle United fans were horrified of the prospect of playing their games south of the river.

Hall once again had a chance to show his loyalty to those who had helped him when Paul Stevens lost his job Director of Recreation after being involved in a brawl with a local Member of Parliament over a barmaid.

Hall immediately announced that Stevens was a valued friend of the family and found him a job with Cameron Hall Developments.

Since then the fortunes of both Gateshead and Newcastle United have improved considerably, both club's positions improving both on and off the pitch.

United fans in particular have long starved of success and are prepared to throw their money at the club amidst a wave of emotion sweeping the area.

Greed

Fifteen hundred fans paid #3000 for membership of the Platinum Club, a glorified season ticket, and another 30,000 fans have bought season tickets for the current season ensuring capacity crowds at every game and a guaranteed income to the club of some #10,000,000.

Not content with this however, Sir John Hall has introduced a bond scheme whereby fans cannot buy next years season ticket unless they pay a further #500 on top as a bond.

This last act of greed has brought screams of protest from the usually subservient and loyal fans, many of whom are unemployed.

Their protests, however, have gone largely unreported in the local press.

When the bond scheme was announced, the press conference was held in the south of France where most of the local sports reporters were enjoying an all expenses paid holiday courtesy of Douglas Hall.

When Robert Maxwell attempted to manipulate the press, he bought the papers.

Sir John Hall just bought the journalists.

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

written by whom?

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

Yeh - but SJH was the good guy v the previous Westwood/McKeag etc dynasty.

Alls fair in love and war.

Nobody forced us to pay the extra #500 - I reckon a couple of extra decent cup runs and the buyers would have been in profit. It was effectively what a hard up company would call a cash call. We at the time needed every penny to pay for KKs extravagant gamble to win the League - if we'd done it we'd have the cash to build a solid footing behind the most attacking team seen around in years.

You don't get to the top in business by being a good guy - SJH new what he wanted and nearly got it. At times he was severely into NUFC for millions (I know he got it back many times over) but at the time he wasn't guaranteed to get any of it back.

THE NOTW is an example of the worst in journalism - anybody any feelings for the Daily Mail ?

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

>>Shortly after this in a move reminiscent of the Newcastle take- over, Cuscani was removed from the board and John Gibson became Chairman of Derby County and his son as Chairman of Oxford United.

eh John Gibson??? There's shurely been shome short of a mishtake, Moneypenny ?

-- Anonymous, August 07, 2000

"THE NOTW is an example of the worst in journalism - anybody any feelings for the Daily Mail ?"

Jeremy Hardy summed up the Daily Mail quite nicely:
"I don't particulalry mind Sun readers, because they know that Sun is basically bollocks with tits in it, the ones who worry me are the Daily Mail readers, because the Mail dress up appalling prejudice as though it's quality journalism: 'I just read a very well argued piece on the need for a military crackdown on people with freckles.' "

Can't disagree really, can you? :-)

-- Anonymous, August 08, 2000

Soft Lad

Aye, let's all batter down the doors of the freckled menance!

-- Anonymous, August 08, 2000

and who prints the 'Metro'? (free morning paper in London) and isn't the London Evening Standard part of the same group?

And which prat wrote the storey that from 30 phone calls by which? healthcare to the NHS Direct they got one wrong? They gave the Metro the headline that NHS Direct 'Risks Lives' - drivel. When the same story came on Radio 5 they asked if the results would be any different if they visited a doctor personally, "errrr, good point" was all they'd concede but what I heard on the radio (when Which were interviewed) did not resemble the paper. (some good journalism by 5live team - fair and balanced springs up)

-- Anonymous, August 08, 2000

Whats wrong with freckles , ive never come across that one before , but would happily write to the journo who wrote that piece of bollox .. anyone got their e mail addresse and the article pls ?

-- Anonymous, August 08, 2000

Can we find the address of the editor: I would have thought if someone pimps 8year old Cuban girls into kissing a man suspected of sex offences that would be considered a perverse act. So why did the NOTW editor get away with it for the picture of Gary Glitter the day after he was found guilty of being picked on by the media.

-- Anonymous, August 08, 2000