YOU STUPID MORONIC IDIOTS KNOWN AS JOURNALISTS, STOP DISTRACTING ME WITIH YOUR CELBRITY NONSENSE!

It wouldn’t be the first time that the press has caused anger, whether it be through the paparazzi, political scandals, or just good old fashioned swearing on live television, we can always count on the fact that live news feeds will somehow or someway tick somebody somewhere off.

Now one of the biggest things that has shocked the world into crying/anger fits is the death of the King of Pop, Michael Jackson.
there were those who cried over the loss of this musical genius, then there were those who angrily punched the nearest object, because they just realised that they had spent £500 on eBay for a single concert tickets and will most likely not get there money back, because the man who sold it to them, happened to be a “business man” from Lagos, Nigeria.

So let me tell you my thought process during the first day of all of this:
1) Oh how Sad
2) The music industry has taken a big hit today
3) Oh well, time to get back to work.

It took about a day for me to get over MJ’s early demise. maybe my exams forced me to man up, and get on with my life, or maybe I’m secretly a cold heartless fiend who couldn’t give a damn about the world…. I like to think it was my exams that got me through this because I did make a Facebook group dedicated to him, and I’m really not that evil.

Now the unfortunate fact about Michael Jackson is that whatever he does or wherever he goes, the paparazzi/press will not be far behind. To be fair, in this particular case they did us a service by informing the world of this horrible incident. Though in other cases, they can be rather annoying. For example:

I don’t give a damn that MJ might have slept in an Oxygen tank
I don’t give a damn about where he stayed during his trips to London
I don’t give a damn that he chose to hid his children’s faces when they were younger (although I do have to say that if you were as famous as he was, you wouldn’t want anyone knowing what your children looked like, just to spare them the torture caused by these pit-bull we call journalists).

By this point, you’re probably wondering what all of this has anything to do with my exams… well let me tell you.

Normally each morning, while making my way to the library, I like to pick up the newspaper. Now in this case, it was pretty obvious what was going to be in there. What I was expecting was a page or two about what had happened to Michael. But what I got was 8 pages of literature on the history of the King of Pop, from his days with the Jackson five all the way to his O2 concert dates, and finally his Death.

I quickly became bored, and started revising. The next day, more scandals were reported about where he is going to be laid to rest, and something else about his Will. Now don’t get me wrong, I can understand the need to keep people informed. But the more these nitwits write about MJ’s life and death, the more people seem to call me and distract me from my much needed revision time.

It hasn’t only happened in this case. Every single frigging time that some celebrity does something that is determined news worthy, I get a call or a text or an email telling me about it!

Since when did wardrobe malfunctions become news? Why the hell would anyone care about the weight of some Pop diva? What happened to real news, about real politics, have-a-go heroes, and lost children? It as though all anyone seems to cares about these days is to do with celebrities/wannabe celebrities, and what they do with they’re free time!!!

There is a word for you people who report this type of news. Unfortunately, it’s too rude to put into this article

Real news is slowly becoming obsolete, and it will be a very sad day when the top story at 10:00pm news, is that Britney spears has become pregnant, after a 5 day marriage which ended in divorce, due to lack of communication.

So to conclude my rant against the people who have forgotten how to report issues that actually matters. You are Imbeciles and you don’t deserve your jobs.

“A petty reason perhaps why novelists more and more try to keep a distance from journalists is that novelists are trying to write the truth and journalists are trying to write fiction.” – Graham Greene

By Saahil Chatoo

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“Psephologists” I hear you say? Well even Microsoft Word doesn’t recognise it, so I don’t blame you for that look on your face. Then again, the spell-checker on Word is set to American, what do they know!?  Here is where my Classical Studies comes in. I rarely get to do this so please bear with me for a few lines, and then we will get back to the topic at large… (clears throat) Psephos (ψῆφος) is the ancient Greek word for ‘a pebble’.  Pebbles were used when casting a vote in the ballots in ancient times. Hence psephology is the scientific study of elections (If only you could see the grin on my face right now).

These psephologists look at any piece of statistical data, process it, and draw a hard-hitting conclusion which, to be honest, anyone could have told you. The most recent and amusing example is the one of young people registering to vote. After the second Prime Ministerial debate on Sky News (and BBC, but still called the Sky News debate… I digress) it seemed that many more young people were registering to vote. The psephologists rushed in and diagnosed:

“It is clear to see that the influx in young people registering has a direct correlation with the live debates. The debates have roused the political spirits within young people in the UK and the results are clear to see in the fact that they have flocked to register.” – Anonymous psephologist.

Let me present you with a scenario. You are a college student given a task on a Friday. It’s not particularly taxing and will require minimal effort, maybe five or ten minutes work. The teacher has requested it back anytime before next Friday morning, or anytime before then, however no later.

After consulting several polls based on the above question, a poll of polls has been constructed and the results show that the majority of people interviewed, conceded that they would leave the assignment till the last minute and do it hurriedly then. If we transfer this mentality to the registration arena, it is obvious that young people leave things, like registering, to the last minute, as they do with everything in life.

It is in our nature to be nonchalant about everything until the deadline is within touching distance. It has nothing to do with the fact that ‘the youth’ watched the debate on Thursday and were passionately inspired to register. The deadline for registering merely coincidentally fell 4 days after the debate. As youngsters rushed to their local polling stations to register, the psephologists pulled out their calculators and deduced that politics had become cool again. Apparently Adam Boulton was the new David Dimbleby… I think not.

It is my humble opinion that the media get far too excited about any plausible correlation between anything related to the elections. Gone are the days of the ‘Breaking News’ ticker on the bottom of news channels talking about terrorist attacks or natural disasters. Now we must endure annoying Twitter-like updates of Gillian Duffy’s whereabouts and feelings.

The media make a meal of anything and it seems that the simplest explanation can never be the correct one. There appears to be an obsession with graphs and polls, which if manipulated properly can serve any purpose required, as the tabloids have proved.

The media have lost themselves further credibility with their insistence on turning to Facebook, in particular, to get the opinion of the masses. The Sky News website integrated a Facebook status thread during the debate last Thursday, where anyone who changed their Facebook status whilst watching the debate would see it appear on the thread. Although some users offered some intelligent insight, most comments chose to abuse the respective leaders. This was entertaining, however hardly served to enhance the political process.

I would love to end with wise words about voting or politics or even the media, but I think it would be insensitive to not have a moment of silence for the political career of Gordon Brown…

Thank you.

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Behind My Screen I sit comfortably and ponder about what to do, about this old technology I have of communication.

Behind My Screen I use MSN, Facebook, Twitter and Skype. Where I socialise with people across the world, and

Behind My Screen I hate you. I will abuse you with most harmful words and feel superior, but

Behind My Screen I fancy you. I will create the most romantic of words expressing my love for you, but you won’t realise it.

Face to Face I will be mute and may smile timidly, even though I came across as eccentric over a text, and

Face to Face I will stutter for words and feel uncomfortable in the awkward silences even though over BBM my replies were instant.

Face to Face I will be quiet, badly groomed and dressed, even though I only tag photos that I look good in, but

Face to Face I wouldn’t know what to do. I take out my phone to pretend I’m popular but but actually I’m nervous only hiding Behind My Screen.

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