Peter Rhodes: Find the toddlers
Peter Rhodes on why TV isn't telling us the full story about the migrant crisis, why John Kerry should choose his hats carefully and a good reason not to ignore cancer screening.
THE Local Government Association says tougher punishments, including jail sentences for housing-law offences, should be imposed on rogue landlords. And what about rogue tenants?
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A READER, studying images of the US Secretary of State, says: "Take John Kerry, add a fez and you've got Tommy Cooper." Now you mention it. . . .
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A NASTY strain of sexually transmitted disease has appeared in Leeds, Macclesfield, Oldham and Scunthorpe. So that's a northern-cities, drug-resistant super-gonorrhoea. I keep thinking of Mary Poppins.
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AFTER I admitted my dislike of social networking, a reader sent me the tale of a man who learned about what happens on Facebook, but didn't have a computer. Undaunted, he decided to try doing the Facebook thing anyway. He started telling total strangers what he did the night before and what he'd had for breakfast. He showed them pictures of his wife and kids, plus some holiday snaps from Corfu, and announced his plans for the rest of the week. Sure enough, he quickly attracted four "followers" - two policemen, a social worker and a psychiatrist.
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LOOK back at the images of Princess Diana's funeral in 1997 and you'll see picture after picture of mourners sobbing their eyes out. You will get the impression that London was awash with tears. I was there and it was not like that. In fact, one photographer covering the funeral told me he reckoned only about one person in every 100 was even slightly tearful. But every picture editor and TV producer in the world demanded tears, and that's what their snappers and film crews supplied. Much the same is happening today with the refugee crisis. From the long shots we can see that most of the migrants are young, fit men, some travelling in large groups. But that's not what the TV bosses want. They want exhausted mothers and distraught children, and so that's where the cameras linger. It's not the full story but, hey, doesn't it claw at your heartstrings?
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IT REACHED a mawkish low point at the weekend when the BBC website featured an adorable baby in pyjamas crawling on the ground in front of a line of riot police. No stage-managing there, then. And if you felt like complaining about such coverage, the Beeb had thoughtfully closed the borders at its "Have Your Say" page. On a day when the migrant story was the biggest event in the world, Auntie Beeb was inviting comments only on embryo research, police budget cuts and gonorrhoea.
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MEANWHILE have you noticed how many migrants remembered to pack felt-tip marker pens for writing slogans ("Where are the human rights?" etc,), in English, when the cameras just happen to be there?
LAST week's item on NHS bowel-cancer screening brought an a email from a reader whose test proved abnormal. It led to the discovery and cure of a rare and potentially fatal tumour, not in her bowel but in her stomach. The DIY bowel-cancer test may be embarrassing but it detects all sorts of nasties. In the words of Nike, just do it.
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THINGS to do on a rainy day. Go to YouTube and search for "Cockatoo loves Elvis." I bet you laugh out loud.
