Saturday 19 October 2013

More comments & your questions answered

 

Mr Blacksmith, while I accept your right to criticise I am very unhappy at your tone. The parents are suffering and you seem unable to react in a humane  manner to the terrible blow they've had.

M/S Mythbreaker, Tunbridge Wells

Sorry, I never reply to people who write to me in green ink. I'll let the Bureau's social affairs spokesman answer instead:

Dr Heffer: Hello. According to Bureau statistics since May 2007, 36 000 children are known to have been eaten, had their limbs chopped off or burned alive, or killed in some other way across the globe. South Africa has untold thousands of HIV infected orphans limping along on an  unviable long-term diet. They are largely ignored.

Many thousands of couples in Europe have watched their children die in hospital, in road accidents, of genetic problems and by criminal attack. They are largely forgotten. Partly because they haven't run screaming to the press. Tragedy and family loss are a normal part of the human condition and, in the end, strike everybody. Some social scientists suggest a connection between obesity in advanced western societies and emotional obesity leading to outbreaks of comfort mourning.


John, why are the media still telling lies? When will the dam break?

Hoper, Kingston upon Thames.

First of all, can I ask you a question? Would you rather the McCanns gained another £500 000 with a libel win to spend on grand hotels, crooked associates like Halligen and the pursuit of an ex-public servant?

There is no direct evidence that the parents did anything to their child. So the media have no truth defence if they claim they did.

The dam may never break. If it does and the McCanns are pursued by the media for some criminal act the sight will be at least as revolting as media  behaviour over the last six years.


Why does the media fawn over the couple?

Anita O' Day, "Turn Me On", Sacramento, California.

Why not? It's safe, raises the emotional temperature nicely and sells papers. No risk, little cost: a no brainer really. And most of the public love it.


Sorry mate but you are just a wind-up hater. Don't get cancer will you mate? Now I'm off with the other lads for a game of football on Hackney Marshes and a few jars afterwards and a look at a dirty DVD. Get a life mate.

Judy Drooly. Sent in error.


Dear John. Is there any hope for Clarence Mitchell?

Separated, Mrs X,  Railway cuttings, Hendon Central.

In the long run, no.


What power do you think lies behind the couple? Surely it is not possible that they are indeed unsupported?

WG Sebald, Dresden, Germany.

The power of soap opera and our difficulties in confronting real life directly. I include myself.


Mr "blacksmith" as you call yourself one day you will have to accept the social matrix as determined by the Frankfurt school and its analysis of power, instead of indulging. Cameron is the public face of the forces that you don't understand.

Miguel Sousa Tavares, Santa Maria Álvares Pereira Street, Ramsbotttom, Lancashire, UK

I'm sure you're right.


Esta é a mensagem que eu quero traduzido google: Suas palavras não são minhas, Blacksmith seu porco. Todos Lisboa, ambos os lados do rio Ebro, concorda com me.Try um novo navegador com tradução automática.

Pedro Silva [for it is he]

I'm sure you're right.


Are the press telling the truth yet?

M/S Paula Rego, "Welcome", Sussex.

The press never tell the truth. The mistake we made in 2007 was to think the all-cost defenders in the press believed what they were being paid to write. And drove ourselves nuts wondering what they could see that we couldn't. We shouldn't do that again.


JB –  I used to like what you wrote but now you sit on the fence. Join us.

TB Ward-Nurse, Address withheld.

No. I go by the Archiving Summary into the interrupted investigation. Every word of it.


What is the best guide for someone new to the MM affair? I have a lot of time to read for the next seven years.

Julian Assange, Knightsbridge, London.

With apologies I recommend my own work, rather like a London Guardian contributor. The Cracked Mirror //http://madeleinemccannaffair.blogspot.co.uk/ won't win any prizes but it's the only thing I've written on the case that I don't and won't delete.


Can Goncalo Amaral sue in the English courts for libel?

A. Abulafia, Gerona, Spain.

In the UK he must sue within twelve months of the first appearance of the libel.


What did I do wrong at the tribunal?

Brian L, Liverpool, England

Even judges can't free themselves completely from the hold of soap opera. You abased yourself. That is why you have been passed over for  LCJ. The curse of the McCanns on everyone who gets too close.