Friday, January 25, 2019

Scotland's shame: the disgraceful behaviour of the Daily Record and David Clegg

I was trying to remember this morning when it was that the scales first fell from my eyes about what a disgusting, disreputable publication the Daily Record is.  It was actually long before the independence referendum and the notorious "Vow".  About ten or fifteen years ago, there was a documentary on Channel 4 that featured fly-on-the-wall footage of a young brother and sister being interviewed by a Record reporter.  They were in an incestuous relationship, and wanted to bring to wider public attention a phenomenon called Genetic Sexual Attraction (GSA), which causes siblings who didn't know each other during childhood to feel a strong attraction to each other when they meet as adults.  The Record reporter gave every indication that he was primarily interested in GSA and that the subject would be treated sympathetically, but he must have known even as he was sitting there that he was about to betray their trust.  The documentary later showed their shock as they opened the newspaper to discover a splash that essentially branded them as perverts, and only mentioned GSA in passing.  The quotes that were included from the interview were all taken out of context and were presented as a feeble 'defence' against accusations that had been ranged against them.  Needless to say, the Record hadn't even bothered to give them the courtesy of a warning about what was about to hit them.

Would the Record attempt a story like that now?  I suspect not, simply because public attitudes about sex have become more liberal and it would rebound on them.  Incest is still regarded as wrong in all circumstances, but there would be a greater willingness to listen sympathetically to a reasonable explanation.  But even if the parameters within which the Record are able to ruin lives have changed, their readiness to ruin lives in pursuit of a sensationalist story has not changed at all.  Their appalling front page today is just the latest in a long line of examples, and David Clegg's eagerness to promote that front page on social media will be a mark of shame until his dying day.

There is a gloating, mocking air to the words "Alexander Elliott Anderson Salmond, you are accused of..." which leaves no room for doubt that the Record's agenda is political revenge.  I suspect that any complainant would be deeply distressed to see their accounts weaponised in that way, and also trivialised by the unmistakeable use of "Cluedo"-type language.  Meanwhile readers are clearly being invited to believe that the only salient point is that Salmond has been charged with the offences that are itemised in huge lettering.  There is only the tiniest of token nods to the fact that the charges have yet to be tested in court.  Essentially Mr Salmond's right to a presumption of innocence has been totally disregarded.

In case you had any remaining sliver of doubt about what game the Record are playing, Salmond is branded at the bottom of the page as "the face of independence", a point expanded on by an article by Clegg that tries to argue that the independence cause has been seriously damaged.  Anyone would think it was the Yes movement that had been charged with sexual offences.  Anyone would think that politicians from other movements and other parties are immune to criminal charges, or to the possibility of personal misdemeanours that are self-evidently unrelated to their politics.  Even very recent history tells us otherwise.

And yes, I know the front page of The Sun is, if anything, even worse.

45 comments:

  1. As Scottish Skier has alluded to, the No side's internal polling must be spooking them.

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    1. Paddy Varadkar has said troops could be positioned on the border. Barnier says a way must be found to not have a physical hard border. The British say there will be no hard border under any circumstances. Varadkar continues to use the threat of violence as a remain tool.

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    2. Another early uncorking for Cordelia, then.
      Hic.

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    3. I love that Kent English vintage plonk, glug hic.

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    4. The EU will force the England* to stick to the GFA agreement with sanctions or military force if necessary. The troops are the latest hint at this.

      N. Ireland must stay in the SM+CU, meaning any hard border must be down the Irish Sea. Sanctions and troops will ensure this and a border poll -> reunification if needed.

      England, which has zero allies on the N. Irish question, will be in no position to resist.

      England needs to stop its foreign interference in other people's countries / lands. N. Ireland does not belong to the English conservative party.

      ---
      *It is England, as only England is resisting a border in the Irish Sea. The peoples/governments of Scotland, Wales and N. Ireland are not.

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    5. "As Scottish Skier has alluded to, the No side's internal polling must be spooking them."

      Published polls at the moment generally show No a little over 50%, and in the 40-50% when hypotheticals about Brexit are included. Why would their internal polling be any worse for them than that?

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  2. If Clegg's belief that this accusation damages the Yes Indy movement, what would accusations/convictions/wait-until-they're-dead accusations involving Westminster Labour/Tory/Liberal MPs result in. We'd have left the Union years ago

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  3. The saving grace is that vanishingly few read newspapers and even fewer believe them. Journalism is, with a handful of notable exceptions, a dishonorable profession. The Record will never be Pulitzer Prize territory.

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  4. I think we are definitely at the "then they fight you" stage.

    Regardless of what happens or doesn't in the Salmond case, it has heehaw influence on the democratic deficit that Scotland faces as a province of Greater England.

    But well done Daily Rancid in potentially polluting any future juror pool

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    1. If Clegg hasn't been extremely careful, it'll be a filleting from the sheriff for contempt.

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  5. Several decades ago following a worker being killed in an accident in Glasgow which the Record put on front page in large upper case type "Man decapitated by lift" I stopped reading it. The man in question was someone's "son, brother, husband, father etc. It is beyond shame and should be closed down as an affront to common decency.

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  6. There seems to be a lot of people leaving themselves open to being sued if the charges are thrown out, or if a not guilty or not proven verdict sre given.

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  7. My Daily Record moment was their Devil Dog campaign.
    The lies and exaggerations about the nature of dogs in general and a breed in particular was disgustingly manipulative.
    I only had a mutt but I read widely about dog's and knew this campaign was well..... Shite!
    And that's the trick... When they write about a subject that ye know a wee bit about ye can't help but see the lying...
    Now we have the internet to look things up for ourselves they are truly rumbled.

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  8. This is all BetterTogether#2 has to offer this time. The few aces they had were all played to stop the collapse of a 40 point lead to a 10 point one going all the way in 2014.

    This the positive case for the union. That's it. It's all they have.

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    1. Bitter loser and English hater you are skier. We will trash you again if another vote is called. There are plenty of us Brit Scots around. I can see why Knickerless wants to be in control of immigration. She wants to ethnically cleanse the real Scots.

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    2. Cordelia's positive vase for the union, based on sick fantasies.

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  9. Re the Record, I found some circulation figures for it and the S. Mail.
    December 2018
    Record 118,603 down 15% on same time last year.
    S. Mail 122,653 same as 15% as above.
    Long may it continue. And the Sun tripled it's losses from '17 to £91 million.

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    1. You fascists just seem to hate anything that moves and breathes. English yesterday the rags today. You see a threat in everything. You lot are like 1933 Germany.

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    2. Cordelia's been reading old back issues of Battle while drinking again.

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  10. You Nat sis should cheer up an have a Willy Waught.

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  11. “Brit Scot” says it all �� Consider yourself an oxymoron (or part thereof)

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    1. I do not know which part of Wexford you hail hail from Mickey however Brit Scot is a legal term and we even have Brit Irish.
      Mr Salmond claimed to be British prior to the 2014 referendum and he was correct.

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    2. I first encountered the term Brit Scot while serving in the British Army.
      The way I was treated as a Scot serving in the British Army and what I saw of how the British Army conducted itself in N.I. is what started me on the road to being an SNP voter and later an SNP member.
      I was on duty at the official ceremony at the governor's residence in Belize City on when the UJ came down the flagpole at 23.59 and the Belize flag was run up at midnight when Belize became independent, 21 September 1981.
      I long for the day when I watch similar in Edinburgh.

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  12. Even the English are giving up on being British.

    http://archive.is/Skiwz

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    1. That will be people living in England who are not English.

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    2. This began with devolution. It grew into EVEL.

      Brexit is seeing it break the UK.

      The good thing is that British & English are so conflated, English nationalism's destruction of the UK won't be seen until it's too late.

      See GWC's post for example. The enemy of Britain is behind him, not in front.

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    3. GWC, do English independence supporters 'Hate the Scots'?

      Asking for a friend.

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  13. Clegg is not doing anything to improve the image of N Ireland immigrants in Scotland. Just another bigot.

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    1. There are not any NI immigrants in Scotland.

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    2. Apart from the thousands of bigots parading through the streets in their crimpolene uniforms. Or do they not count? Clegg is a raving Ulster Unionist UVF bigot and will be thrown out of my country soon enough.

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  14. I want a 32 county democratic socialist republic with a federal capital in Athlone and four provincial parliaments

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    1. I want the road tolls cancelled in Ireland and free beer fur ra wurkers. I do not want democracy in Ireland as they keep calling fur another ballot like the Jocks and wasting taxpayers money. I want Cordelia tae blow Gabriels Horn up the back of the tenement close.

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    2. Cordelia's newly found respect agenda lasted less than 24 hours before it went back to screaming about its inner fantasy life.
      It can't help itself; as a result, it should seek help. Immediately.

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  15. Poor Cordelia, sobbing and screaming in its permanent tantrum.
    It deserves only our pity.

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  16. My don't trust the Record ever again moment came over 20-years ago,when, as a freelance journalist, I got hold of a good story about a well-known Scottish footballer.

    Unfortunately, I got one important fact wrong: my fault, I misunderstood totally what I had been told. Any way I sent the story to both the Sun and the Record. The Sun came back to me, they had checked one of the facts - the one I had got wrong and when they got on to me, I immediately realised where I had gone wrong.

    The Record mever got back to me. What they did do, however, was take my story, then spin one or two things round into a hatchet job on the footballer. Then, when he complained, they blamed it all on me.

    What the Record didn't know was, the footballer was a friend of mine, and he asked me how come the Record and the Sun stories were so different - since he knew I had written both.

    I then sent him a copy of the original story I had sent to the Record, which his lawyer took into a meeting with the Record, at which they again tried to blame me. Result, a very nice damages pay-out from the Record to the footballer.

    From that day to this, I have never done any work for that paper. Their management are totally evil and a disgrace to journalism.

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    1. Did the fitba player ever have a joab besides the hobby?

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    2. Poor Cordelia and its Commando comic world view.

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    3. What is the odd one out? Dandy, National or Beano. Which one makes you laugh most?

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    4. The Clydeside comic that is the Daily Rancid.

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  17. I love Leo Varadkar. He's both a Hindu and a Catholic. Much more sophisticated than the Free Presbyterians

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    1. Well Leo would probably like a free shot on the swings in free Stornoway.

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    2. Cordelia's trying to make friends with itself again.

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    3. You seem rather obsessed with this Cordelia! Are you Cordelia?

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  18. A friend of mine whos business partner was taking huge sums of money out of the business without his knowledge which resulted in the collapse of the company went to the daily record once he had got on his feet again and set up a new company. He wanted to tell his story and no doubt get a wee bit of publicity for the new company at the same time but what he didn't bargain on was the DR doing a total hatchet job on him. It was then that I realised just how journalists were mostly a bunch of lowlife scum.

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    1. The problem with this tale is why would a sensible chap have anything to do with the record. And you do not name the names of the journalists. Did he report the theft to the police?

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