and finally...


Forget the news, people want trivial twaddle


Smut and nonsense are favoured in the media – but they aren’t news, says Chris Proctor


I


’ve got a distant relative called Toby and I hope his mother doesn’t read this as he’s a wastrel. Not just


a common-or-garden loafer but a dedicated, full-time good-for-nothing. Half man, half duvet, he makes sloths look like highly toned athletes. He was bemoaning the lack of progress on three essays he hasn’t written that should have been handed in months ago and complaining about the endless length of his university terms which eat into his snorkelling and skiing habits when he told me that, if his studies go as badly as he fears, he might have to become a journalist. So just to recap: he’s bone idle,


shows no interest in people who aren’t serving him an iced negroni, doesn’t like writing and is utterly indifferent to deadlines. So he thinks he might turn his finger – a whole hand would be too much to ask – to journalism. I said with that attitude, he could go


far. I didn’t specify. (The antithesis of Toby’s spectacular


apathy was a Glasgow scribe I once knew who was so tied to his trade that he could not bear to put pen to paper without payment. He hated writing cheques, and said he wouldn’t give an autograph if he was asked. This was never put to the test, but he once invoiced his mother for sending her a holiday postcard.) Anyway, my new fear is that Toby is going to get his wish: he’s not only going to become a journalist: he’s going to make it – big. Why? Because it requires a certain type of person to provide the hollow


nonsense and insignificant twaddle that the modern consumer appears to crave. They want to know about gents who’ve been nipped in the Maldives (very painful), Meghan Markle’s sarnies or a man who injects gel into people’s posteriors in Harley Street. Lacking any human qualities,


Toby is no doubt fascinated by this trio of trivia – to the point that he would be prepared to get out of bed – or at least sit up – to report on them. He, not me, has a finger on the pulse of British culture: he knows what people want. And it’s not Gaza, equality or sustainability. I regret to say it’s smut. Most of us were more relieved than


anything when the Sun stopped showing pictures of topless models on its third page. Apart from anything else, it was grubby. You didn’t want to sit on the tube next to someone who was examining a young lady’s anatomy. It was uncomfortable, like being squashed up to a person chewing raw onions or picking his nose. Remarkably, it is only 10 years since this daily dirt ceased to be shovelled: January 2015. Anyway, it did stop and well done the No More Page 3 campaigners. Well, we thought it had ended.


But now: at the slightest excuse, it’s back – bigger, bolder and bouncier than ever. There was a lady at the Grammys, an


actors’ school prize day, the marvellously named Ms Censori, who popped off her coat to reveal that she was wearing a transparent dress that made it look as if she was in her birthday suit. Is this news? I can see it could be a cause of concern. She could catch her death of cold for one thing – or was her lack of clothing a sign of the perilous


state of the US economy? Or does it show a dearth of psychotherapists in that nation? One thing it’s not is news. And yet


the ‘story’ featured in just about every media outlet on the globe apart from Tehran Today. To qualify as a news story, there used to be some minimum criteria, like you had to report something unexpected or point out what was going to change as a result. Nothing was going to change as a result of Ms Censori popping off her togs at the Grammys. She had nothing to change into. Now I accept that if Keir Starmer


“ ”


divested for a press conference this could be considered a photo- opportunity. In fact, given the public perception that our leader is a charisma-free zone, it might not be an ill-advised PR stratagem. It may even be news. (On the other hand, Mr Putin sitting on a horse with his top off is not a lead story. It’s just weird.) Gentlemen at the Grammys


I wonder how effective the ‘no topless models’ campaign has been. Why is a déshabillé lady unsuitable for The Sun but fair game for the broadsheets?


occasionally trudge along a red carpet without a shirt but they are dismissed as racetrack losers rather than media sensations. All of this makes me wonder how


effective the ‘no topless models’ campaign has been, and if we need another one. Why is a déshabillé lady unsuitable for The Sun but fair game for the broadsheets? And then I come back to Toby.


He would have reported the Ms Censori story. He didn’t need to research it. He didn’t need to write it. All he needed to do was pick up his mobile phone, an activity he is (just) capable of undertaking and there you go – he’s lined up worldwide exposure. Meanwhile, I’m trying to flog a nib to a diary.


theJournalist |27


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