Tarts and hookers
I've written before about the way in which the tabloids have acted with all the subtlety of a tonne of ants at a particularly sugary picnic with regard to the latest Wayne Rooney stories. And I've tried to argue that these stories don't come about because of any hypocrisy on his part, or because of his endorsements or picture spreads in glossy mags talking about family values, or any particular moral outrage - they are published purely and simply because a lot of people get a buzz out of reading about other people's sex lives.
Earlier on today, I looked at the way in which a 'pal' of one of the women involved in this story said that she was 'not a nice person' and enjoyed drink and drugs. The 'pal' may not of course really exist, or may be someone who only vaguely knows the woman concerned; whatever the truth, they don't sound like much of a 'pal'. They may not be telling the truth but it's a pretty good gamble that once someone is outed as a sex worker their reputation could be said to be pretty low anyway, and that you can get away with saying what you like about them, accurate or not. That's how it is, unpleasant as it is; I'm not saying it's right, but it's the way this kind of thing is viewed.
You might remember from the Tiger Woods saga that the women involved with him were reduced to mere numbers, like holes on a golf course:
And I think there's a similar dehumanising process going on with the women involved in the Rooney story. They aren't people in their own right, but hookers and tarts:
The Sun refers to the 'tarty twosome who gave soccer rat Wayne Rooney a threesome'. And then there's some intrusion (or it may be speculation) into the life of Coleen Rooney:
Rooney's shattered wife Coleen will go against her family's wishes today by seeing the Man United striker for crisis talks.
It's not as if the Sun has ever been caught telling porkies about something like that, is it? Oh, hang on:
As part of our coverage of the break-up of Cheryl and Ashley Cole's marriage we reported on March 4 the singer would fly to France to meet her estranged husband who was texting her lines from her songs. We accept Cheryl did not fly to France, no such texts were sent and she denies saying she was scared of life as a single girl as we reported on March 1. We are happy to set the record straight and apologise to Cheryl.
Well, who knows whether it's true or not? It is intrusive, whatever it is. This is part two of these stories - the pictures you'll see on the Sun website and elsewhere are a bit poor quality, like they've been blown up too much; they've almost certainly been harvested from Facebook-type sites or other websites. In the battle to scrabble around for a fresh angle, it doesn't matter who gets hurt, has their privacy ruined or gets dehumanised - we need a new story, we need to dig some new dirt, while it's still fresh. And that's what we get. We learn nothing, really, from all of this; we just get treated to more and more of the same.
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Hello. I'm a Bristol-based writer and soon-to-be-redundant journalist. You can read more about me and the Enemies site here, or follow me on Twitter. Email me if you like - antonvowl at live dot co dot uk
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September 8th, 2010 - 16:17
Yeah but ya know he’s like a role-model for the kids ain’t he? So it’s like all in the public interest right?
[sigh] As you say it’s just a way some people can justify their titillation by defining it as ‘news’. Of course if it didn’t sell papers they wouldn’t do it; so who’s in the majority, those who avidly follow every new ‘revelation’ or those who don’t?
September 8th, 2010 - 17:01
But they are tarts and hookers… the Tiger Woods story was a bit of a different thing, but personally I don’t really consider it dehumanisation when the women being talked about have chosen to sell their bodies to whoever has enough cash for a living. I don’t think they deserve to be talked about as ‘people in their own right’ for that reason tbh.
September 8th, 2010 - 17:44
People can be dehumanised because they’re sex workers? Christ.
September 8th, 2010 - 20:31
I think Kim has something approaching a point – I have no problem with someone being called a tart or a hooker when they have apparently, as this woman has, not only gone out of their way to sell their body to footballers but then also sold their story. If you want to profit from such things in such a way then I’m sure you can take being called a couple of nasty names.
September 8th, 2010 - 23:21
To be clear, I think there’s a key difference between someone who finds themselves at the centre of attention not through their own actions – like the previous sex worker whom Rooney went off with who was called lots of incredibly pleasant things, like the “auld slapper” – and those like the woman in this case, who have no problem with being the centre of attention. I’m not saying that it’s pleasant, but there’s the old saying of if you lie with dogs don’t be surprised if you get fleas. Sell your story to the press, don’t be surprised if you’re then dehumanised in other papers, or even the one you sold it to.
September 9th, 2010 - 11:19
But not everyone in this story has sold their story. If you read it, you would see that only 1 of the 2 women has sold their story – the other has had the dirt dished by a ‘friend’.
September 9th, 2010 - 13:02
i agree with anton. these women are women! perhaps call her a sex worker or a woman who works as a prostitute if you want to call her by her job title. but tart, hooker, slut etc – these are demeaning terms that hurt all women.
She hasn’t killed anyone, or abused children, has she? She shouldn’t be treated like dirt because she’s a sex worker, and that is what the sun/star is doing.
i personally am against the sex industry and there is no excuse for the kind of vile sexist language the papers are using. we don’t know that circumstances led her to be in the industry, or sell her story. perhaps she’s a nasty person, perhaps not, but it is beside the point. it is rooney who is at fault. he’s the one that helped fund a terrible industry. but he is still a national hero and his reputation won’t really be hurt by any of this, once the hand wringing is over.
they are women, they are people. they should not be dehumanised – look at how littlejohn talks about women who work as prostitutes in his editorial.
September 9th, 2010 - 17:57
reply to sianushka:
She clearly chose this line of work, just as she apparently chose to go after footballers. I’m hardly some anti-politically correct mouth-breather, in this case I really don’t see any problem with calling a spade a spade. I realise there’s a level of complicity in that newspapers actively encourage people to do this and then still treat them like dirt, but seriously, if you don’t want to be called a tart and a hooker, which, let’s face it, are relatively tame adjectives when there’s slag, slut and whore and much worse which could easily be used, then don’t sell your story to the newspapers in the first place. Rooney is indeed the one at fault, although as Anton has pointed out already the whole thing is about as interesting and surprising as being told that water is wet, yet she’s just been more than heavily remunerated for the discomfort of being called a couple of unpleasant names.
February 3rd, 2012 - 08:27
Hi JudithI’m with @dontgetfooled.The Beeb are aiceptcng what is no more than an allegation – that in the complainant’s opinion a statement is defamatory – as fact. That is not even neutral.We all know that statements made by solicitors/lawyers in non-evidential letters have as much authority as they would on toilet paper, but with a threatening name attached. Unfortunately some members of the public don’t.Equally, anyone who makes allegations of violence without solid proof deserves to be exposed.Rgds
September 8th, 2010 - 17:57
No.
You sound like Littlejohn when he rants about the Bradford and Ipswich murders.
September 8th, 2010 - 18:49
WTVF? It IS dehumanisation, and misogyny. These women are peoples’ sisters/daughters/mothers, and people in their own right, whatever you may think, Kim.
September 10th, 2010 - 14:35
if you believe that, septicisle, you can call them women who work in the sex industry or prostitutes. tarts, whores and sluts are nasty vile words. they have no place in a headline and they re-enforce misogynistic views.
September 8th, 2010 - 17:25
“An onlooker” or “A pal” or “A bystander” or even “A source” and for a bit of validated bullshit “An expert” are widely used, and as seen in the Starsuckers film I watched last night, figments of whoever writes the stories imagination.
Great film. I can see myself getting into some mischief phone call situations over the next few weeks. “George is a known wind-up merchant, according to a saucy expert pal.”
They also do an excellent section on the treatment of call girls, kiss and tellers and how they newspapers are in effect the pimps.
Women have sex with someone famous. Tabloids pay women later for story. Readers lap it up.
Back to the crack pipe to take away the pain.
September 8th, 2010 - 18:42
“Rooney tart” did strike me as paricularly horrid. That’s all she is. A ‘tart’ that Rooney fucked. Nothing else. Or so that phrase suggests to me.
September 9th, 2010 - 12:07
“If each man or woman could understand that every other human life is as full of sorrows or joys or base temptations, of heartache and remorse as his own, then how much kinder, how much gentler would he be”
September 9th, 2010 - 19:05
Ugh, have you seen that piece by Bel Mooney in today’s Mail? Basically rants on about how shocking it is that two nice middle class girls could become hookers, oh what is the world coming *wail*? Right, because if they were from council estates, then the whole thing would’ve been okay! Also loved the bit where she commented on women who have to sell themselves because of their drug addictions and basically dismissed their plight. Because they are poor and they don’t matter.
Sorry for the slightly OT rant Anton, but that really pissed me off.