Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
#1
Ah the Press..often painted as hated low life Dickensian snivellers yet sometimes much loved for the stories they bring us. They keep us safe in our beds by exposing wrongdoings on a grand scale. Yet once again they have had a finger wagging and ticking off from the judiciary.
"But Judge..." gulped Fleeet St en masse.
I speak of course of the Max Mosley episode. Our learned judge has decided that it was okay to have a sex orgy, but... should the sex orgy have involved Nazis then it would NOT have been okay, and would have been fair game for the media. Interject the Nazi phenomena into the late night sex episode and horror of horrors this would have been bad enough to warrant an expose. "No Nazis, no expose!" sayeth the judge, meaning an ordinary orgy is okay, an everyday occurence so "Press Keep -Off". No wonder the poor newspapers are confused. Okay this may be a simplification but that's roughly how it reads.
Max Mosley is the son of Britiains leading Nazi of times past..Oswald Mosley.
These figures in high places are rather too well protected now since this ruling. Dont we all want to know if our leading figures are having orgies or not..of course we do, even if they leave their jackboots out of the equasion. Despite these liberated times we still somehow cling on to the notion that our public figures should be better than we are. In fact we insist on it. Our biblical heritage still smoulders in our bones.
There was a chap or two in the recent past who came a cropper bigtime due to similar expose's. One thinks of a well known TV sports anchor man, a household name at the time, twas some years back now, but who never really worked again on TV following similar shenanigans.
So the appetite is there to know about such goings on, and when we find out about the sleaze we dont like it, and will punish the individual. We it seems want our public figures to be fairly squeeky clean. But who is going to keep this squeeky clean status quo if not our brother hacks.
#2
Personally I couildn't care less even if I were paid..........it really is about time people realised that we are all, regardless of status, human! If Clinton has a BJ in the White House, what does it matter? If it swings his thing to wear a pink tutu and rub fruit into a hippopotamus, what difference does it make (as long as No Animals were Harmed in the making of This Programme!!) Truly, the only things that might impact on the status of an "influential person" is his or her integrity and honesty. I am more disturbed by Ruth Kelly deciding to ignore her faith and allow the abortion bill free passage (not necessarily because of my views but because of hers). Adulterous sex is clearly an issue if it is an issue for the spouse and kids, but not if it isn't, and I don't really feel I have the right to question them about it!!! As long as they do the job they should do, and do it well, I am Not Bovvered!
Guest 656- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 2,262
#3
I, like everyone else want our leading figures to do their job and do it well but I also want their honesty and integrity to run right through their private lives as well as their Public life. Heaven Forbid!! if we had to read about Gorden Browns alleged antics or indeed for Americans to hear that Obama had been up to no good in his private life, no one would want this, they, I strongly suspect would be bothered, I know I would.
#4
Honesty and integrity sometimes have nothing to do with sex!! I think it is probably possible to have a few quirks in the personal life without it leaving you unable to do your job properly, even in the public eye. I guess it depends on the definition of Integrity and Honesty.........and how we measure it. I think the part of your post that strikes me, Colette, is that part about not wanting to read about the antics - I agree - let people have a private life as long as it doesn't impact on their job, let's not read about the leg-over stuff of the great and good, let's just all get on with our lives!!
Guest 675- Registered: 30 Jun 2008
- Posts: 1,610
#5
I have often thought that if, when Clinton's White House BJ hit the press, he had just 'sorry but she offered it to me on a plate and I'm only human', he might have got a bit more respect for honesty at least. The hunt for scandal by the media often leads to ridiculous events being made to appear scandalous. Clinton was a perfect example of it. At one NATO comference he was censured by the press for having visited a jazz club with the Czech Prime Minister and they had a couple of beers. Would I be alone in thinking it would be a better world if more of the world leaders were able to socialise in this way rather than staying ensconced with a room full of 'advisers' before such meetings?
Politics, it seems to me, for years, or all too long, has been concerned with right or left instead of right or wrong.
Richard Armour
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
#6
ah indeed...
The Problem though Bern is that these events do impact on a persons ability to do the job he is elected or selected for. Nobody will view Mosley in the same way again as he now has a bucket of hopeless sleaze chucked over his persona. Some sleaze is worse than other sleaze but on a scale of things this was pretty bad. Okay he was cleared of the Nazi element but the rest we are all too well aware of now...lying, cheating, mass fornicating with orgying hookers...oh dear! He has already been asked not to appear at some grand prix races, impossible situation if you are head of the F1 movement.
Ah yes we all say that in the pub dont we...I dont care what he does as long as he can do the job, but in the cold light of say the polling booth we think differently.
Yes as Colette B said, can you imagine the impact if such a thing was to be revealed about Barack Obama. His fall would be even quicker than his meteoric rise...and that's a racing certainty.
And so despite much liberalisation in scoiety we still remain uptight bigtime about our public figures.
Guest 663- Registered: 20 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,136
#7
The problem is people who live in the public eye should always understand their lifes,
will always come under scrutiny what ever they do.
And those that put you up there will tear you down just as quick.
Guest 649- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 14,118
#8
It is all told in my life story, or will be when I GET THAT FAR.
Vic Matcham
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
#9
victor
i had not realised that you knew mr mosley.
getting back to the issue,i agree with mr mosley saying that his privacy had been invaded.
he is not a leading politician or religious leader that tells us all how iniquitous we are.
he is just a simple multi millionaire that chooses to in the odd orgy.
everyone got paid at the end of the day.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
#10
''everyone one got paid(and laid) at the end of the day''.
Anyone who is daft enough and rich enough should know better than to get caught and exposed by a group of hookers.If he is not clever enough to conduct his sexual life in private he can't be that smart and should not be running the world's richest sport.Which at the time happens to be dominated by the Brits.He has let down the rest of the F1 organisation.
Now I what I did was........oops
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
#11
PaulB - unusually, I disagree with you. It is not the actions that affect a persons job performance but the media attention and hounding that does so. And it would not do so if we all just accepted that people are fallible (unlike the Pope, clearly). And I would like to think, Chris P, that Clinton would have had a better response from the public if he had held his hands up (so to speak!) and admitted his fallibility, but I am not sure - and that isn't a reflection on the public as much as a reflectiion on the media attention and judgements the episode attracted and the apparent need to put puiblic figures on a pedestal and then moan if they don't live up to the adulation. I don't know where it comes fom, this need to adore people!! Fallible and flawed human beings are much more interesting and have much more experience of life than perfect and clean-living paragons!!!!
Guest 675- Registered: 30 Jun 2008
- Posts: 1,610
#12
Sadly Bern, to judge by the ridiculous number of 'celeb expose' mags I saw lined up in Boots today, this obsession with so-called celebrities is now a self feeding monster. When coupled with the British presses insatiable desire to bring down the famous, wether they deserve it or not, and the seemingly endless morbid interest their readers have in the most salacious gossip we are not going to get over it for a long time. I have always consoled myself with the logic that those who complain most about other peoples sexual habits are those who aren't getting any.
Politics, it seems to me, for years, or all too long, has been concerned with right or left instead of right or wrong.
Richard Armour
#13
Guest 660- Registered: 14 Mar 2008
- Posts: 3,205
#14
If you knew what I know,we would both be in trouble!
Guest 675- Registered: 30 Jun 2008
- Posts: 1,610
#15
That's not what you say in the pub John.
Politics, it seems to me, for years, or all too long, has been concerned with right or left instead of right or wrong.
Richard Armour
Guest 660- Registered: 14 Mar 2008
- Posts: 3,205
#16
You must have mistaken me for someone else Chris,
1. I don't drink
2.I am never seen with any ladies apart from my wife,or people who have problems in my Ward.
3.If Howard mentions Doverstar..........I will Sue
If you knew what I know,we would both be in trouble!
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
#17
Sue... Sue who?... surely it can't be...surely not our very own Sue you know who...oh Matron
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
#18
surely the man "protesteth too much".
no names, no pack drill.
your secret is safe with me john.
Guest 660- Registered: 14 Mar 2008
- Posts: 3,205
#19
Secrets Howard,I don't have any,otherwise I will appear in Dubris........
If you knew what I know,we would both be in trouble!
If you knew what I know,we would both be in trouble!