Help, Please Re The Mail

[FredPuli43]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2533320/Private-school-boy-17-died-hit-taxi-walked-dual-carriageway-New-Years-Eve.html

Is there something irrelevant in that Daily Mail report ? What ,if anything is it, and why is it there?

[baza]

a Skoda Rapid taxi?

[Zeuhl]

Well the exact amount of the school fees is a vulgar and irrelevant detail in the circumstances.

[Gromit]

He attended Private School.

Stories like this make me wonder if he or the family were known to the journalist. It isn't really a national news story yet it is a very full account.

Didn't quite understand this bit?

// One witness, calling himself RJT, said: 'I was a witness to this tragic accident.
'I immediately called 999 but a car was on the way down. I tried to flag him down but could not and witnessed the impact. //

[Zeuhl]

You're right gromit

That sequence if correct suggests there was a problem requiring a 999 call before the impact. Was the boy walking or lying in the road I wonder.

[Sqad]

Fred.....LOL....I know where you are coming from, particularly the "Mail" entry into your headlines.

Newspapers are there to investigate and to report news and if there is no news then to find some........if they don't then they go out of business and there certainly is no chance of that with the Daily Mail?

Give the punters what they want and you will do well.....in your field Fred, medical expert witnesses give the solicitors what they want and one has a good income for life...........as with barristers.......-;)

News is short and the Political struggle between left and right is continuous and in the main....boring.

Now in answer to your question.....public schoolboy, well liked , good future ahead walks on a dual carriageway on the way home from a New Years Eve party and is killed.
Now if one had to choice between THAT incident and a p1ssed 18 year old falls from a balcony in Magaluf and is pronounced dead....which story would sell your paper?

It is a cruel world Fred.

[mikey4444]

I'm struggling to find much wrong here. Young people like this are killed on a reasonably regular basis at this time of year. I can't see that there anything amiss in providing some personal details in the news report. A tragic event, that will have devastated this boys family.

Skoda cars are used as taxis pretty much everywhere in Britain, from my experience.

[emmie]

and better perhaps than Freddie Starr ate my hamster.

[emmie]

is it because he went to public school, at x fees, don't know, but seems pretty clear to me.

[FredPuli43]

It was the fact that he was at private school being headlined, plus the fees, that intrigued me. A 17 year-old boy is killed on a road. I tried alternatives Youth/ "benefits claimant/ Muslim/unemployed youth/State school pupil..killed" but none was any better.

So why did the paper choose these facts? Because the middle class would identify with the family: "There but for the grace of God goes our son". Because the readers are supposed to be more shocked at the death of someone from a rich or fairly rich family? Why?

[emmie]

i doubt that many are truly shocked over this sad death, young man is hit by car, dies at the scene. It may be irrelevant to use the various facts, but they are facts nevertheless.

[naomi24]

I didn’t read any of that into it, Fred. Had he been a student at the local comprehensive, I’ve no doubt that would have been mentioned. It’s usual for such a report to include some background information.

[boxtops]

Naomi, that's what I was going to say, newspapers stuff in any background information they can find. If he'd been a married man with kids, they'd have put in "Joe Bloggs, plumber, dad of six". It's what they do.

[FredPuli43]

Would this story have made the Mail but for these details? It is a story which would be in the local paper for the area,but why is it in this national one?

[naomi24]

The Mail had a spare column to fill?

[Zacs-Master]

Because it's a slow season for news.

[anotheoldgit]

/// Why is it there ///

A young life has been tragically lost, that is why it is there. Some also criticise why the fact that he went to a private school is relevant, it perhaps is not but newspapers try and make as much column space out of a story, especially on a slow news day.

But is this any difference from the regular stories of all those young lives that are lost through stabbings, and don't they also report that the victim had a great future in front of him, was well liked by his headmaster, who also adds that he was a valuable member of the school, who was soon to apply for a place at university.

Perhaps if this poor lad had been of a different skin colour FredPuli43 would not have been so criticising?

[jake-the-peg]

Fred's right

Rerun the story with a kid from a Salford getting hit on the road at 3:30am and see the comments

I'd be all ' Why was he on a road, probably drunk at 3:30?' and ' I wouldn't let my kids out unsupervised at that time'


The school angle is clearly there to flag up to the readership where their sympathies need to lie

The Mail is telling their readers what to think again

Mind you from the comments it seems once again their readership isn't as stupid as they think it is!

[Zacs-Master]

It's becoming tedious watching you try to turn EVERY thread into a race row AOG. Please desist, it does your credibility little good.

[FredPuli43]

Zacs at 9.39, I threw in the alternative of "Muslim..killed" to tempt AOG into going off about race again. It may have worked. Though I do wonder whether the Mail would have used it.

[Zacs-Master]

I do wish you hadn't. It's a bit like showing a dog a lead and expecting him to not want to go for walkies. Cruel.