To think Paperchase shouldn't have apologised?

[jenniferl1983]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42057493

Paperchase have apologised for a promotional giveaway that was featured in the Daily Mail. They were lobbied by the campaign group Stop Funding Hate and have now promised they ''won't ever do it again''.

AIBU to think they shouldn't have backed down so easily on the back of some social media messages? Businesses seem now to be so scared of causing a media furore that they now apologise for anything (see the 1 gender fluid man who got Topshop to change their dressing room policy).

This isn't an incident where someone has received appalling or dangerous service or been discriminated against, it's just a promotion in a newspaper. I don't understand the ott grovelling.

Well, given that many people behave like children online, plus the fact that I would reckon quite a lot of MNers are young enough to be my children, I think there's plenty of need to talk as though they are...

There's something quite wonderful about someone going by the name Flowerpoint attempting to be uber-patronising.

thecatfromjapan
There's something quite wonderful about someone going by the name Flowerpoint attempting to be uber-patronising.

Is there? That's interesting. I wouldn't know you see, as my name's Flowerpot.

Stop Funding Hate have issued a press statement:

The Daily Mail kindly invited Stop Funding Hate to provide a comment for their next article about our campaign. We're not yet sure whether this made it into the final piece, but here is what we said:
"The Daily Mail has the right to print what it likes within the law, and we all have the right to choose not to fund it.
With growing concern that the hate in our media is fuelling hate crime on our streets, is it any wonder so many of us don’t want to subsidise this through our shopping?
Stop Funding Hate is all about polite and friendly customer engagement. Most people in Britain have little power, but one thing we can do is use our voices as consumers.
We'd urge the Daily Mail to reflect on why so many feel attacked by its hostile coverage, and why brands might want to distance themselves."
ENDS

extinctspecies Thanks for that.

I have searched all over the SFH website and can find no definition of hate.

I have searched all their press releases, and can find no definition of hate or *hate speech.

I have asked many posters on this thread, and others, who accuse people/posters/media/journalists etc of hate to define hate and nobody has been able to answer.

If there is any SFH representatives on this board, could you please precisely define what you mean by hate and hate speech, so we know what the heck you're talking about.

Flowerpot, I admit defeat in that I don't think it's possible to get a watertight definition of 'hate' so let's assume you win that point.... but I think what those of us who disagree with how the DM presents their 'facts' have a problem with (call it whatever you like) is using often made up stories to ramp up/create tensions/fear/blame etc. on certain groups eg. Muslims, take this story for example....
www.dailymail.co.uk/home/article-4046558/The-Mahmood-family-apology.html

These are real people with real feelings who I can imagine (although can't prove) will have been subjected to some pretty 'hateful' reactions from strangers and even people who knew them. I imagine you'll say this doesn't prove that the DM is spreading hate against Muslims but I would argue that I've never seen them make up a pack of lies about a white man being a terrorist.... They have however defended white men accused of sexual assault and blamed the women concerned.

Some other examples of 'not hate' but pure lies which hurt people
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/apr/12/melania-trump-accepts-damages-and-apology-from-daily-mail

www.theguardian.com/media/2014/jul/11/george-clooney-rejects-daily-mail-apology

And just for a bit of humour
www.thepoke.co.uk/2016/12/21/generate-daily-mail-apology/

Exactly. It's biased towards the campaign's viewpoint. They want brands to pull advertising from those companies they think are full of hate. It's not a neutral research group. It's a campaign with a viewpoint. It's biased.

Any campaign is promoting its own viewpoint. Why describe it as biased, Flowerpot?

*if Paperchase thought the connection with the Mail was boosting its customer base I suspect they'd have ignored HNH
And.. so what?

*Paperchase can't even have formed a general perception of what their customers want since a) they didn't verify that any of the SFH campaigners were customers anyway and b) they only looked at the complaints. Nobody else even knew there was a campaign against them which customers could counter. That's not just no market research, that's not even getting a general perception of its customers.&

It wasn't a secret campaign, you know. Anyone who wanted to counter it was free to do so. Paperchase, as a commercial company, is perfectly free to take a commercial decision based on the feedback it is receiving.

that is the relevance of the my comment that this is a marketing campaign, as opposed to, say, an election or an opinion poll.
So what? We haven't been discussing election or opinion polls.

You're the one who said they should have canvassed opinions from people other than those who contacted them. You seem to consider that commercial companies should operate according to election/opinion poll principles rather than straight marketing principles.

No doubt they can now start their own campaign to get the decision reversed.
Yes they could. But that's not what we're discussing.

Well, it is, since you seem to feel that Paperchase should be listening to other voices. If the owners of those other voices want to be heard, it is open to them to take steps to bring that about.

Who said they loved the tie-up?

My point precisely. I don't believe that Paperchase's potential customers were that keen on the connection with the Mail: if they were, it would have been noticeable in terms of their sales and profits, and they would probably have taken a different decision. You suggest they should not have taken this decision based solely on the views of those who contacted them; maybe they didn't - maybe they took into account the views implicitly expressed by virtue of customers' lack of positive response to the tie-in with the Mail.

if Paperchase thought the connection with the Mail was boosting its customer base I suspect they'd have ignored HNH
And.. so what?

Surely the answer to that question is absolutely obvious?

I disengage

Translates as: I can't produce a respectable argument.

Surely the concern he is not that paperchase (originally) chose not to use DM because of its political leanings. Or that 1000s of consumers used their power to boycott and paperchase acted as a result of overwhelming mass protest by consumers. Surely the issue is a small band of internet trolls were able to agresivly intimidate paperchase into a full u-turn and apology?

And isn't that at least a concern. Has history not warned us about when one political ideology has used in intimidation to make businesses boycott the businesses of other groups?

As a general principle I always remember the Pastor Martin Niemoller. A man who had supported the NAZIs use of intimidation and tactics to shut down the Comunists (embodying that sentiment is the Vile DM so who cares):

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

All I am saying is paperchases decision was due to a moral change of heart, it was not down to the masses using their purchasing power. It was as a result of aggressive trolling by a small bunch. And we have to be a least a bit careful when I small extreme bunch start throwing their weight around, demonising political opposition (I think DM is quite capable of that them self the shit bags) and say what is and isnt acceptable to trade with. Personally I don't think the masses give a shit if a company does buisness with DM or not. So it's disengenus to make of that paperchase u-turn was a result of the masses using free speech and purchase power.

How about they don't advertise with the DM in the first place. No need to apologise then...

Surely the issue is a small band of internet trolls were able to agresivly intimidate paperchase into a full u-turn and apology?

Is it? They simply publicised the facts which, let's face it, weren't a secret, and invited people to respond. They didn't send anyone round to intimidate Paperchase. No-one would have contacted Paperchase unless they agreed with the premise that supporting the Mail - which needs no lessons in aggressive intimidation - is something they find unacceptable.

I think the irony meter just went off the scale at the concept of someone quoting Niemoller in support of a paper with the Mail's history of targeting minorities.

My post wasn't abusive: I gave you credit in not believing that you lacked the intelligence to understand the connection between the success or otherwise of the Mail promotion and Paperchase's reaction to the HNH initiative. Not my fault if you didn't want to take that credit, or that MN misinterpreted the post - I'm sure they don't claim infallibility.

And I do like the irony of accusing someone else of abuse at the same time as accusing them of a widespread practice of making things up, which in itself is seriously abusive - particularly when you don't bother with anything inconvenient like evidence.

1Dad2Kids: that doesn't quite work. The Daily Mail has considerable power (and money) - far more than most of the people its editorial team choose to abuse and demonise. If Dacre and co were to feel that they (collectively or individually) had been intimidated/defrauded/slandered/libelled they have plenty of access to good legal advice - and, like any other individual, the right to report a crime against them to the police.

There has been no state intervention in the Paperchase/SFH/Daily Mail business at all - nor have any laws been broken. It's not a slippery slope to censorship when individual members of the public exercise their right to criticise an organisation and refuse to give it their money. It's a matter of public opinion being appealed to, and then listened to. Paperchase choose to act the way they did - another company might have said roughly what John Lewis said, or even 'Fuck off, you lefty snowflakes, no one cares' (though perhaps more diplomatically.)

1Dad ironically just like your last post everything you say re Niemoller applies far better to the Daily Mail itself than to those conscientious objectors (I prefer that to internet trolls ). Every day they normalise the treating of minorities as ‘different/less than/dangerous etc’ and that is something that can ultimately end very, very badly as it did back in 30s Germany. That is a far more worrying outcome than the idea of ‘internet trolls’ dictating where a company advertise don’t you think?
Very simply the DM hurt actual people, this campaign doesn’t (or even come close).

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