Thread 16: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

[DisappointedReader]

The Observer's original exposé: The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were ...

The 14 Observer items currently available on their online 'The real Salt Path' page: The real Salt Path | The Observer

More from The Observer:
‘Hope is extinguished’: CBD patients respond to Salt Path...
The real Salt Path | The Observer (The Slow Newscast)
I will link to two more Observer videos in the first post of this thread.

The Observer YouTube Channel: The Observer UK - YouTube

Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement: Raynor Winn

Thread One ^www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5368194-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?^

Threads 2-11: Links all in the OP of Thread 12

Thread 12: www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5384574-thread-12-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 13: www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5386458-thread-13-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 14: www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5388981-thread-14-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

New posters joining us in the genuine spirit of our civil discourse welcome. It would be helpful to get the background from at least some of the Observer items above before posting. There are currently a number of interesting items on The Observer website and linked to above.

To all - Please be extremely cautious when it comes to naming or implicating people and addresses not in the public eye or with no direct connection to the story, and around the understandable health speculations, especially where details are unclear or still emerging. Remember, even Hollywood rabbits attract the odd flea. Please do not engage with visitors who seem to have their own agenda and seek to derail. Avoid @'ing and quoting them as - from experience - this will only encourage them back to the threads. We have done amazingly well together for fifteen very interesting, very serious and very silly threads so far. I can't be here as much as I'd like so all help with keeping our discussion walking along in our usual reasonable and respectful fashion is very welcome.

Yes, it really is Thread 16.

Keep to the path. No saltiness. May the fudge be with you.

I understand what you are saying @YarrowYarrow I am sorry if I got that wrong, the guardian article I read said that the readers had sued and the publisher had to make refunds to those people who could prove they had bought the book before the scandal broke. Either way they had to pay people even if it was under the threat of being sued. I was not advocating that readers did that in this case, I was purely using James as an example of action working.

A very serious and deceptive medical claim is made in TSP this is that a terminal diagnosis was given to Tim in 2013, there was no diagnosis, everything Salray writes about Moth suffering from CBD in the timeline of this true account are lies about his medical condition and a miss representation of a diagnosis given in 2015.

I personally think this miss representation has been harmful and it needs to be addressed, no one is going to be able to take a legal action against Salray, but those complicit by their silence might be compelled to speak out, very unlikely though if no one makes any noise. I think as you @User14March Raymoth themselves have lost credibility.

Actually, it's a good point. Would people on this thread be willing to provide proof of purchase to show that they bought TSP before the Observer story, believing it to be true, and would you go to the trouble of sending it off, plus a torn-out page 127, to get a refund?

Apparently comparatively few readers of AMLP did so in the US.

I think in an age that seems to increasingly accept truth to be a nebulous concept ( "my truth" "alternative truth") rather than empirical fact it is important to stand up and call out deception.

One of the most famous "truth questioners" in history (although what he actually meant by "What is truth?" is still debated) is Pontius Pilate, a complete psycho not by the liberal standards of the 21st century but by those of 1st CE Roman governors. It serves some people well to cast doubt on the existence of truth itself and they invariably have a self serving angle of benefit to noone else.

Here's one I prepared earlier. As always please, no posts until Thread 16 is completely full:

Thread 17: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5403285-thread-17-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 16, formerly known as Thread 15 et al, will shortly be departing from Post 16000 having changed its name to Thread 17 by deed poll. No correspondents, posters, lurkers, fudge, cider, scones, naked hikers, hashtags, Our Chloes, Our Simons - cardboard or otherwise - or holders of wild pooing portfolios, left behind. Please form the usual disorderly but highly respectful queue. The charabanc engine is revving up with the odd backfire and puff of smoke.

Will the last dawdling stragglers please pick up the keys for the shed of doubt, a bucket of water for the squid and repost the Thread 17 link whilst you're at it.

Thanks @DisappointedReader !

Is it fair to say that 'disappointment' is no longer the governing tone of the threads, though? More like frothing, eye-rolling, and a certain amount of black comedy involving headless cardboard Simon Armitages and whether SW is contemplating poisoning TW's tea so that she can say 'SEE??? I told you he was sick! Watch this space for On Winter's Hill!'

And yes, thank you, as ever, @DisappointedReader!

Not sure I would blame you if you namechanged and decided to only hang out on the chicken-keeping board for the next year or two.

Ooh, that's the woman who came up on my Fbk 'you might know this person' list over the weekend with the 'Dal Dy Dir' background pic. Looks like we've got mutual friends in common. Small world!

No,not my friend. I was quite intrigued by the title. I was wondering if it was poking fun at
Hoe not to dal dy dir, but I don't know as I don't speak Welsh.

Sorry, I meant I've got mutual friends with this author, not that you have. Poorly worded! By the looks of it, it's a story about a family trying to hang on to their farm after the death of a patriarch, and the lead character, Cerys, is a journalist who's trying to help them, and who gets more involved than she expected (according to the blurb).

Dal dy dir is described in some places online as a Welsh Nationalist slogan (https://www.thefreelibrary.com/Dal+dy+Dir.-a0625710338) and it is also a charity helping disabled people

Just want to add my thanks to @DisappointedReader and everyone…I joined Mumsnet specifically to learn more about the SP fiasco because my level of indignant frothing was uncontainable, my desire for the truth was insatiable, and the original AIBU thread popped up in a search. A friend was concerned about “witch hunts” - I told them I’d just be lurking/reading, not contributing.

BUT…

Then I listened to long hours of SW reading LL; I force-fed myself on TWS 🤢; I OD-ed on the yellow gorse, the blue sea and the purple prose; I became consumed by the threads - I learned about glumwashing and sheds of doubt and damp squids….roles were assigned and psychological opinions sought - it was all too much and I could hold back no longer - (like SalRay when she first glimpsed Tim with his Mars bar and cup of tea). I took the plunge and joined the conversation.
It hasn’t been a witch hunt imo - just good-natured, witty, intelligent, banter and detective work - underpinned by a desire for truth, fairness, decency and the materialisation of HNTDDD/the silenced nephew/Dave-like-and-Julie. I have witnessed a lot of, ahem, human kindness from Mumsnetters towards those with chronic health conditions, would-be authors, small-business-owners, homeless people and homeless squids seeking shelter.

It’s been like the best book club. I wish we could play the drinking game IRL (except it would mean reading TSP again) and I’d absolutely buy the board game if it ever gets made.
❤️

I think there must be something in my eye after reading two or three posts today.

@ShrinkWrappedInSeattle That's a wonderful post. Thank you.

@YarrowYarrow I will be unpopular here, but I don't think TSP itself makes any health claims that are 'dangerous to the public'. It's quite careful not to.

Well, this is a bit of a challenge - I suspected we would be in an explicit/implicit situation - so I had to have a look.

What I wasn't expecting is: how casual some of the references are. In fact, I'm shocked.

Scene : near beginning of walk. Cast-iron bladder. CBD was supposed to cause incontinence, but certainly didn’t seem to have affected him so far.

Scene : where Exmoor meets the sea. Moth was tiring and finding every step a struggle. I was leaden and achy. It could have been our lack of fitness, the emotional exhaustion, the CBD, or maybe it was just the chips.

Scene : looking out to Mount's Bay. We should add ‘don’t get cold’ to the already extensive list of things to do to counteract CBD. What had the consultant said just three months ago?

In my experience it can be important to ask the question even if you suspect it will not be answered, or there will be hand-waving or outright lies. The fact is then on the record that the question has been asked and what the response was.

There is enough evidence to very strongly suggest that How not to Dal dy Dir (Gangani, August 2012) was written by the same person or persons as TSP et al. Chloe Hadjimatheou - an experienced investigative journalist - believes it and so do most of us. It is right that Chloe asks the question and goes as far as she can with it until a paper or download copy turns up, which I believe it will. I also believe it is now right for the awarders of prizes to ask the question of Sally Walker as Raynor Winn, and of her agent and publishers.

As we know from Sally Walker's statement on her Raynor Winn website and elsewhere, whatever answer she does or does not give Chloe and the awarders of her prizes in answer to the direct questions 'who exactly wrote HNTDDD?' and 'as it is a matter of record that your husband published it and you refer to the book in your statement, do you have a copy to show us?' will still be illuminating.

Even without a copy of HNTDDD, the evidence is there to show that the questions need to be asked and that not to ask them would be remiss.

I think in an age that seems to increasingly accept truth to be a nebulous concept ( "my truth" "alternative truth") rather than empirical fact it is important to stand up and call out deception... It serves some people well to cast doubt on the existence of truth itself and they invariably have a self serving angle of benefit to no one else.

Individuals will be side lined and minimised

it's not enough to know

it is still worth sticking up for what is right.

underpinned by a desire for truth, fairness, decency

I don't think we can just let these medical claims continue to be made, or supported by the silence of those who could speak out

What I wasn't expecting is: how casual some of the references are. In fact, I'm shocked.

I do have hope & belief that those who live morally & with integrity are noted for it in life. Cheaters gonna cheat but honesty prevails & people get found out eventually & we know who the deceivers are in end.

Very few of us, if any, object to 'artistic licence', even in non-fiction and memoir. We are here because of allegations - with compelling evidence - of enormous, manipulative whoppers being told about terminal illness, the reality and date of diagnosis, walking and poor nutrition as a cure for chronic, acute, imminently terminal illness, the reality of the embezzlement behind the loss of the Welsh house, the walks themselves, the writing of the books themselves, the good people and small businesses of Wales and Cornwall, entitlement to literary prizes and more. It is not even the lies in isolation but the impact of those lies on genuine sufferers of severe illness, disability and terminal illness and their loved ones, on ordinary people like the Hemmings, the Coles, shop, café and campsite owners, on the genuine homeless and beggars, on honest writers of blogs, non-fiction and memoir and on the reputation of the genre and publishing. We are here doing our small bit to shine a light and to say this is not right. Thank you all for joining me.

Whether TSP makes explicit claims of curing CBD is a salient point for PRH, and the legal side of things.

However, it’s certainly implied. And that is harmful because it’s a reinforcement of an unhelpful belief many people hold - that you can overcome disability. There is too much of this “noise” about trying harder, fighting, doing the “right” thing (exercise). This is just another voice in that choir, but believe me the choir is deafening.

I also recall SalRay chucking about “neuroplastcity” maybe in an interview? Which is usually the domain of the “you can think yourself better/you are in control of pain” brain retraining quacks.

If anyone else is wondering why it's so quiet around here, it turns out discussion has already started on thread 17! The end of this thread is clearly the "boring bit near Portland" of our collective path.

😀

Maybe ferries were should have been taken and parts of the thread 16 path were never walked.

Mistakes were made, after all

Don't get too excited. Thread 17 is almost as quiet as the WWs.

Well, make stuff up? Would be entirely in the spirit of the WinnWalkers, after all. I’m thinking photoshopped ‘pap’ photos of TW partying at the Soho Farmhouse with a mystery brunette, or abseiling, or being breathalysed for drink-driving wearing an Alexander McQueen suit beside a Porsche?

Sally on a yacht with a man corresponding to the description of ‘Grant’, viewed leaving the offices of a rival publisher, or engaging whoever has taken over from Max Clifford to handle her PR?

Ooh, we're at 999! Time to sound the Last Post on thread 16, and rejoin the party on thread 17... https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5403285-thread-17-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film