I was listening to Marina Hyde today talking about AMW…

[CurlewKate]

And she was talking about the media in general using H&M to distract the public from the goings on of AMW. That the press knew lots about A’s activities but because they mostly had an establishment bias they focussed on H&M rather than journalists investigating AMW because it suited the RF more. She said that a particular Miami Herald journalist was an honourable exception-Julie K Brown-and her work is available online and I haven’t looked at it yet, but I will. Interesting isn’t it? Wheels within wheels…..

I must look this up. I really like Marina Hyde and I think she very often talks a great deal of sense. Thank you for the tip.

It was on her podcast- The Rest is Entertainment.

Thank you . DH listens to this religiously and apparently it was today's. I'm on a longish train journey tomorrow so I shall give it a go. I do like those two (RO & MH)
H&M I do think are "entertainment" at least nowadays. But I'll be interested to hear her view, especially if she thinks it was deliberate distraction. I'll reserve judgment until I have listened , but he's good on media. I think once she was taken to court by Elton John for an article and she ( or probably the Guardian ) won , on the basis she was obviously "teasing" - about 2008 I think.

Not so convinced about MH and RO after they completely swerved discussing the BAFTAS this week. I respect them both as intelligent broadcasters who could discuss a difficult situation with sensitivity but they ignored it in favour of an obviously cobbled together last minute discussion of some social media flash in the pan called Clavicular with no long term meaning.

I think it's perfectly possible not to be distracted from the nauseating antics of any royal player.

Of course they do. Although I hate to say this he being used to his other people and things happening..are we now in a recession

I don't think it just suited the Royal family to distract from AMW. If it only affected the royals the press would be all over it. It is the way that the government, the police, the civil service etc ignored what was going on that really needs distracting from. How else can they continue to protect each other?

ColdWarSteve made an interesting point that it also took heat off those involved in the Epstein debacle.

Maybe they thought it would be better to leave the discussion to people more knowledgeable about the specific disability concerned?

Ha! Like that's happening on Social Media at the moment. Obviously they don't have to discuss something just because I think they should, but they just swerved it completely- possibly because Marina's husband works for the BBC - and it just felt wrong to me in a podcast that is supposed to be an intelligent look at culture. Even just saying that they didn't feel qualified to discuss it would have been something. It also meant that the phenomenal success of the lead actor in I Swear went completely uncelebrated which was a real shame.

There was a former Royal correspondent on LBC (only heard part of his chat) & he was talking about the role & responsibility of the media & the fact that journalists have to behave in certain ways otherwise they wouldn’t get the access needed to the Royals.

Yes-it’s weird that they didn’t do a BAFTA show at all-I hadn’t noticed that. I suppose it’s possible it was gazumped by the Andrew thing? But odd, I agree….

Julie K Brown is well worth following. She used to write for the Miami Herald, has spent lots of time with the victims and is largely responsible for Epstein not being able to slip completely under the radar. She has a substack and is a good source for trying to sift the facts from the noise.

I like Maria on some things, but I think a bigger pull back is really helpful to look at Epstein and his network and how and where Andrew fits in

I heard a really interesting podcast talking about the web Epstein had assembled. At one level it operated like the Freemasons, x wanted a visa to Russia without going through but embassy, y was able to facilitate. But there were different levels or access and different ‘perks’

People within the networks gave ‘tips’ to others, introduced others. Epstein was very good at understanding social systems and plugging into them and extracting ‘value’

Some like Andrew traded access and secrets for sex, some traded for access to money, some for power.

it will be interesting to see it unwind, but it affects both sides of American politics, business and academia.

The silence in the US is interesting as this is where the network is most powerful, and I’d consider that far more powerful people than the RF were protecting him, but he was so stupid and entitled he left a very visible trail.

It’s horrific to think that the people at the top of governments were operating in such a way.
This isn’t to excuse Andrew but to say focussing on him detracts from the whole operation which was to concentrate even more money and power in the hands of a bunch of complete shits

Sorry rant over

@Puppylucky just listened to The Two Matts talking about the BAFTA thing. You might find it interesting…..https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-two-matts/id1236139906?i=1000751750915

I was really surprised that they didn't do at least part of their Tuesday episode on the BAFTAs.

AMW was discussed in the Thursday "Q & A" episode, today.

They definitely swerved the BAFTAs with an odd "sublebrity" episode onm Tuesday 🤔 The BAFTAs are a big entertainment deal, a big pointer to the Oscars, and a big UK cultural event that international stars turn up to.

They dodged it, and didn't even admit they were dodging it. Deffo something to do with Marina and her husband who works for the BBC.

I think the Royal family is the media arm of the British State - and as such, is used to be thrown to the wolves as a distraction tactic, so the public can feel they have some say over making their lives miserable. I mean, they're not responsible for the Post Office scandal, the Contaminated Blood scandal, Grenfell, the Dirty Water scandal you name it, but it's often hard to put a name or face to the guilty in those situations; the Royal Family generally act as a buffer.

And within the Royals, there are those who can also be thrown out there to settle the natives - often it might be Prince Philip, or Fergie, or the tall lanky Catholic woman - was it Princess Michael of Kent? - and Harry and Meghan felt they were being lined up as the next fall guys, so they got out. So it all falls on Andy now, he's the designated scapegoat, not saying he doesn't deserve it, but I'm not entirely sure of what he's been caught up in, it depends whether you go with the MSM where one suspects he's been sent Russian prostitutes and wined and dined - and more - them at Buckingham Palace (or should that be 'Fucking 'Em Palace?) or far worse stuff - admittedly more allegations and not from emails - put about on Musk's X.

But yes, Andy is the fall guy so we don't go after the big names on the other side of the Atlantic; seems that's what we Brits are for now.

While I have a lot of respect for Marina Hyde, I don’t think she is always right. She has spoken a lot about the press’ treatment of Meghan in the past, and has expressed a few different opinions about it.

it is worth remembering however that despite this apparent “culture of deference” the only reason that the world knows anything about Prince Andrew and Epstein is the work of a journalist at The News of the World, who followed Andrew to New York and got the photo of them walking together in Central Park. And later, it was the Mail who discovered the photo of Andrew with Virginia Giuffre. There have been hundreds and hundreds of negative stories written about Andrew over the years quite apart from the Epstein angle. The fact that he was summed up in the public perception as “Airmiles Andy” who mostly played golf and used his role to enjoy the high life, had a very spotty personal life and a grasping ex wife is testament to that. I actually can’t think of a recent positive narrative associated with him that didn’t revolve around him being a loving father or a devoted son (and even the former involved him being status hungry for working roles, RPO protection and big weddings for his daughters).

So I wonder where this defence towards him is actually visible? You could say in the fact that his Trade Envoy work wasn’t dug into - but clearly both the Labour and Tory governments did not want that thread pulled.

They record on Mondays so perhaps too soon to discuss the BAFTAs, the fall out was only gathering momentum and it hadn’t been announced what happened (there were actually two incidences and only one was bleeped). May crop up next week

I'm not buying that. They managed to do and extra episode about Brooklyn Beckham and his family - I mean really? What's that got to do with "entertainment"? - but they can't cover the biggest upset to the BAFTAs, the BBC and relations with international movie stars?!

Also, there were eight incidences, not two.

look at the state of this forum, frothing over H&M on another tour lol

??

it’s a reference to the establishment focusing on H&M rather than Andrew, this forum is a manifestation of that:

I always said Andrew has nothing to be worried about. People are far too obsessed with the Sussexes.

Invictus Games are to be held in the UK in 2027 with a visit this year from Harry (and potentially Meghan).

I feel that the scales of public opinion are very gently being manipulated to make AMW look bad (which he is, obviously) and PH and Meghan look better. Slowly warming up the public for Harry's return for Invictus. Exploiting the situation.

It struck me earlier when reading about the various flights into UK airports that exPA travelled on with Epstein and the young women, that a lot of the activities were known, or at the very least suspected, within the police and security services. It’s shades of Saville for me. Widely known about in some circles, including the media, but seemingly not important enough to do anything to stop it.