Tabloids are still terrible, and yet I am surprised

How is it Sunday already? Sunday night even? MASS EFFECT 2 THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT.

In fairness, we're surprised you came back to us.

Anyway, it recently came to my attention that whilst one of my favourite punching bags, our newspaper media, is terrible, we don't have a unique monopoly on god awful print media. Which is honestly a good thing, because when you only have the perspective from one country you get kinda blinkered, and worried that every other country actually manages to have a print media that understands and uses respect, rather than just a word it shouts at people for being deemed lacking in it; notably young people and whatever cultural or racial group has recently been termed a social pariah. Then one of my co-workers gleefully handed me a tabloid from an excursion to America, and they actually used the phrase on the cover, 'Evil Camilla.'

Of course everyone else has terrible print media, it's obvious, but sometimes it's just nice to be reminded.

The cover was regarding the Queen rolling back some of her duties and letting Prince Charles cover some of them. Probably just a ruse to conserve her strength to delay his assent to the throne for as long as possible, and it was very strange to sure such a harsh unthinking criticism of the royal family grace the front pages of anything: it's never something you'd see here. Maybe because it's traditionally unwise to upset the reigning monarchy of the country you reside in, or the fact that the most ill-will the majority of us can direct towards the royal family normally doesn't normally go higher than apathy. I personally stopped caring utterly when the details of how our monarchy gets funded were gradually explained to me; these lease out their estates in return for a cash sum. And we make money off of them, which is nice. Further criticism boils down to the whole 'heredity rulers,' thing, which... actually started to bother me again when instead of just siting their waving as they're supposed to, it turns out that Prince Charles lobbies our politicians a lot, and no one knows what about. Way to keep politically neutral, genius.

I suppose I should begrudgingly get back to what I originally discussed, because it's a good thing we globally share awful newspapers because last Friday I saw some real winners of headlines. Take a look at Fridays's Daily Express:

 ...And the Daily Star:

Well, those headlines look curious, right? If you just take the headline, no other reading, they are very definite, especially the The Daily Express. Amusingly the Daily Star of all things is more accurate; a bloke wants in on the Lotto, will donate more. But what's the small print?

It's the newspaper's boss who wants it. (Also, once again, the Daily Star puts that bit clearer than the Express. The paper with prominent breasts on the front is out journo-ing the other. Whee.)

So leads the important question: are we actually seeing, honest to god, someone using their own newspapers for blatant self-promotion? The second question is: Duh, what else do you run newspapers for? I was at least hoping for him to be subtle about it.

I've come to terms long ago that newspapers are simply devices to spread your own personal world view. If something doesn't fit, trash it or ignore it, of if nothing fits, invent it. Whatever. If I ran my own newspaper I'd immediately shut down the celebrity division, (unless they're doing charity work or something) have no pictures of anybody under 18 without express written permission, and have a heavy bend towards reporting easily-digestible science, and political criticism... which would undoubtedly give me a readership even lower than this blog. That still would dwarf the Guardian's readership, however. But I am still naive enough feel troubled but absolute blatant, no-holds-barred, self promotion. You can do that in full page adverts in your own papers for free if you want. Just leave it off the front page, and don't pretend it's a story.

Of course, if they wanted to talk about how awesome I am, they're welcome to go on right ahead. No shenanigans going on there, because I have no money to speak of to slip them, moreso the pity.

I will give some credit to both papers however that they at least specified on the front page with the headline that the man they were pushing, Richard Desmond, was their boss. It would of been hella unsettling otherwise.

What is happening with that press standards thing? Because, that literally was occurring, like, two months ago, or something, and I've completely forgotten. I remember vaguely someone coming up with a Royal Charter, then the press said no, then someone said, well, I guess we can't force you... Oh yes, it got delayed, I remember now! More consulting time, it needed, apparently. By this point, I would just like a decision, and a heads up on how things will go. If they must be a mass of phone hacking, police-bribing, up-skirt shooting psychopaths, I would very much appreciate them embracing and running with it. We all love the conman who we know is conning us, perhaps we'd find print media more palatable if they winked at the reader and said, 'Well, we got no dirt on this guy now, but I've got one of his friends who's a bit desperate for cash and fame, and we know he doesn't lock his bins. Come back tomorrow to see what we basically made up!' And then we move them to the fiction area of the display stands, so we all know what we're getting into.

Or that would be even worse. I'm sorry, it's hard to tell sometimes. I would give an example of how horrible they've been recently, but it's all started to blur together, unless it's that brain tumor finally making it's appearance.

Though before I go, I have one interesting titbit to mention. You see, Richard Desmond owns not only those two papers, he also owns Portland TV, which in turn owns Television X and Red Hot TV among other pornographic channels. So the next time you ever see the Daily Express start hand-wringing over porn and falling standards... just remember that little factoid.

And snicker.