In defence of Heather Mills

[monkeytrousers]

Please lets set up some kind of corrective to all the spite and venom that is directed at her. I've just read a piece in The Mail which has left me feeling violated it was so insidious and nasty.

The last person I remember being this targeted by the media was Maxine Carr - it's just insane!

I for one hope they can both sort this out and wish the press would leave them alone to do it.

Agree, MT.

I always think it's ridiculous to have any opinion, we don't know them.

Will this be a long thread do you think?

All I know about it is that she is getting told off now for having had nudie photos taken. Which seems completely and utterly irrelevant and just, just, so what??

Exactly, perhaps she is lovely, perhaps she is not, perhaps he is, perhaps he is not, perhaps one was wonderful and the other wasn't.

The media prints it, we don;t have to get emotionally involved with it. We really will never have any idea who did what who did nothing.

I respect Heather Mills for using her publicity for the greater good.

I will worry about relationships of people i know though.

totally agree. Read a peice in our local paper (thankfully no pics) and thought how horrendously she's being treated. Those pics were taken eons ago. Most people have some skeletons in their closet and apparently they're not as bad as the headlines make out. One I read said she's addicted to hard core porn?? It's ludicrous the way the gutter press can get away with this.

Reminds me of bear bating or badger hunting

Thats kinda what i was thinking F&Z, hence my post on the other thread.

Pardon the pun, but, lets face it, its a dirty job, but someone has gotta do it.......

I think you're right FF, but I do worry about he levels of gleeful misogyny in all this. It really really worries me.

I hope they sue.

I really want to petition against the self regulation of the press too.

Yep, me too. Am ashamed of press sometimes. Like FF says, she may not be prefect (who the hell is) but she doesn't deserve this.

here's the story \link{http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/showbiz/showbiznews.html?in_article_id=389280&in_page_id=1773\scraping the barrel}

I also did a search on the Mail website and it came up with 645 articles which as far as I can see are all negatively biased. It's nothing short of a hate campaign

She is honestly passionate about the cause of animal welfare, and willing to step out of her comfort zone to promote this issue.

but that's the Daily Mail for you - easily Britain's most hateful, venomous paper available.
Printed using genuine old ladies' bile!

It does sound rather sensationalist and is particularly venomous towards Heather Mills. From the descriptions of the photos I fail to see how they can be described as 'hard core porn' which I understand to be things like group sex and sodomy (no personal experience of this sort of thing I hasten to add)

Totally agree, P Mc made his own choiuces about whom he married, he is an intelligent man FFS.
She has upped the profile of many needy and worthy causes, she should be applauded for that.
I do not like the campaign against her at all.

woe betide anyone who tries to use the media for their own ends - they'll soon show you who calls the shots. This is like the endless Posh n' Becks-baiting but times a thousand.

agree this doesn't sound particularly "hard-core", everyone knew she was a topless model, so what's new? It's not like discovering Linda used to shag farm animals is it?

The problem is though that the tabloids defend themselves by claiming to be representative of the population, 'if people didn't like it they wouldn't buy it' syndrome; yet they are not elected representatives and crucially are not answerable in the same way our politicians are.

I'm convinced people buy newspapers firstly out of habit and/or tradition - for example if you were brought up in a house where your parents read the Sun or Mail, you are more likely to read it too. Secondly I'm also convinced that after this, comes stuff like the crossword, horoscope and telly schedules, then comes the editorial.

why do people, especially women, read the Mail?

Bundle, because they think it's a real newspaper (when it's anything but, IMO). It seems to me to sell itself as more 'serious' than the usual tabloids, but actually contains the same sort of thing, just in a more insidious form.

I agree with you MT. I am sickened by the personal venom against HM, by people's glee in choosing to villify someone they only know through papers like the mail, and by the sick mysoginystic hypocrisy of the Sun having anything to say about a woman posing for titillating pictures.

MT, I think there's a lot of that, but I also think there's a lot of people who treat this kind of sleb story as if it's a soap opera - just something to gossip to their mates about in their lunch hour. And of course a bit of titillation re supposedly "hard core" porn never hurts, esp if everyone can feel sanctimonious about it.

Oh, but it's poison, surely - to all of us? We shouldn't indulge in it because we are the ones to be cheapened by it ultimately. Oh, what a sorry sate we're in if that's how we get out kicks..sorry, I've come over all sanctimonious..It just makes me so...sad I think, yes, sad!

"why do people, especially women, read the Mail? " - took the words out of my mouth bundle. They just hate women, most stories about women are very negative - it amazes me that the women who read it don't see that.

Clever writing I suppose - sounds all reasonable but when you think about what they're actually saying it is generally implying that women are either hard uncaring bitches who want everything (working women) or stupid people living off the state (non-working women)

jackieno, I think it's actually worse than the red tops, because it's snidey and pretends to be on the side of women (well lots of groups actually, but women in particular)

I wish I earned £500 an hour!