My local Newspaper, possibly the worst in the world...

[ExigeEvan]

"Paedophile Housed Yards from Sketty School"

http://www.thisissouthwales.co.uk/s...AI1pmh9kz1252145364458&success=true#community

Except this story is purely based on speculation, and then in the body of the text doesn't once use the word paedophile, simply "sex offender".

All it's managed to do is begin a lynch mob (atleast in the comments).

 

[Mark T]

My local paper is pure rubbish. All of the stories relate to crime, hardly anything praises the town or picks up on anything positive. There's normally a picture of some single mum on the front page with seven kids complaining that Tesco wouldn't take her 50p off voucher. Unfortunately I have to actually advertise my business in the paper and I have to pay them the extortionate some of £250 per week.

 

[Famine]

According to B3ta, the Daily Express managed a supreme fail in their early edition this week.

The story was a double-page spread with the headline "CAN DEC FI|NALLY MATCH ANT?" (with the page break indicated by the "|").

An editorial decision changed the headline between the early and later editions, as there were too many with "FINALLY" in the issue, to "CAN DEC A|T LAST MATCH ANT?".

Sadly, in some late editions, they changed the first page but not the second. So it read "CAN DEC A|NALLY MATCH ANT?"

Fail.

 

[Dave A]

That's a good one Famine, I didn't see that through the week 👍.

As for Evans example, that's very poor reporting. If he is a paedophile then he shouldn't be near a school, that's true. But to seggest hes a paedophile because he's on the sex offenders register is a very poor view. The register covers a wide base and most of them are way behind the likes of paedophilia and rape, two of the most severe crimes the register covers. To tarnish someone who could have taken a pee in public with the same brush as a paedophile is very wrong.

 

[Sureboss]

If you pee in public you can get put on the sex offenders register? How?

 

[Dave A]

I'm sure it classes as indecent exposure, which is a sexually related crime. Stupid, but true and that could be the reason the guy in Evans linked article is on the register. Yet the paper is calling him a paedophile and instantly making him a hate figure within the community. But they don't have any proof he's a paedo, they just know he's on the sex offender register which doesn't automatically make him an evil and perverted person. Like he could be on it for peeing in public he could be evil and perverted. But without knowing it's wrong to judge and it's certainly wrong to make him out to be the worst case possible and incite others to hate him as a result.

 

[Northstar]

That does sound bad, I mean surely if he was one the police wouldn't let him live there which they are.

 

[Joel]

My town's paper is decent. It usually has a better sports section because they report about local minor hockey, baseball, soccer, etc. teams that won a championship, rather than talk about the pros.

The biggest problem with my newspaper is the "sound off" where residents call in to the paper and talk about something important to the paper. It is hilarious how pathetic what people complain about is. The town is small, around 6000 people, and every Friday 13th, (motorcycles) bikers from all over North America come to the town. (A few years ago, the population of the town went from 6000 to 100000 in one day, then back to 6000 again the next day ). So naturally, since the town is also a tourist town, and most people come for the beautiful lake, bikers also come in fairly large numbers on nice summer days.


Back to the Sound Off, the paper comes out on wednesdays, so you always get the people complaining about the noise of the bikers and that they're a "bad influence". Get real. The friggin people come from Toronto to retire here, then just criticize every damn thing about the town.

We have a foghorn, they whine about that "It's too loud and I can't sleep at night". The town has geese migrating over it in late summer/ fall, and believe it or not, they whine about that "these geese are pooping all over my lawn". The bikers, they whine about them, while forgetting that having the population of the town go from 6k to 80-100k provides an insane economic boost, and a fantastic fundraising opportunity.


There are kids in the town, they whine about the "unruly teenagers out as late as 10 PM!" The town has a lift bridge, to allow tall ships into the marina, THEY WHINE ABOUT WAITING 3 MINUTES FOR A BOAT TO PASS!

Then there's the police bashers. It goes back, yet again to the bikers. These people used to living in a silent city suburb complain that the OPP (Ontario Provincial Police) don't "do their job" properly because they don't stop bikers for being "too loud".


Uggh. I'm sorry i did so much whining there, but it just annoys the hell out of me that these people come into our town and then criticize everything about it.

 

[Northstar]

What exactly do they expect the city to do about the geese?

 

[Joel]

What exactly do they expect the city to do about the geese?

Exactly what i think. It's not like they can put up Geese-SAM sites or something