Pointlessless beyond belief
A couple have separated. The husband claims to have been arrested a couple of times. The end.
Hardly what you'd call a sparkling story, is it? Then why is it even being covered by our friends at the Mail?
It seems the only reason is that they're employed by the BBC. It's a type of story you see every now and then and which strikes this reader as being particularly pointless. The Mail likes to blether on about all kinds of minor celebrities, of course, and journalists (not just BBC ones, to be fair) when they get into scrapes appear to fall within that category for the purposes of news ballast - but really. Who gives a fuck about these two people?
The estranged husband of BBC arts correspondent Razia Iqbal has boasted of being arrested three times in two weeks during a series of bitter messages on Twitter.
George Arney, host of The World Today bulletin on the World Service, has also used the social networking site to describe Ms Iqbal as his 'witchy ex-wife' and the 'Punjabi controller'.
Interesting hierarchical considerations in both the headline and story - George Arney only merits the description of 'husband' because his role as an international broadcaster (on radio) is deemed less important than Razi Iqbal's role as BBC TV reporter. So it's nice to know that it's not just women the Mail can obliterate into the role of 'spouse' when it's their other half that we should apparently really be interested in reading about.
But the story takes a decisive turn for the banal when it reports:
Not all of Mr Arney's tweets have been about his estrangement from Ms Iqbal. On November 10, at 9.42pm, he was concentrating on work-related matters and wrote: 'Just listened to very illuminating interview with Ecuador's splendid pro-people president, conducted by the ever-excellent Fergus Nicholl.'
BUT WHAT DID HE HAVE FOR LUNCH? AND WHEN DID HE GO FOR A SHIT? I MUST KNOW THESE THINGS.
It's a disappointing type of journalism, miserable and tedious, reminiscent of an old tramp scrabbling round in the bins and emerging triumphant with a half-eaten kebab with a fag stubbed out in it. Is this what Twitter has become - a dredging ground for crap journalists to harvest boring gossip about people you've hardly even heard about, who aren't being exposed as hypocrites or liars but just people who have relatively normal lives? Who gives a crap about all this? And what's the point of this tragic little bit of bathos?
A spokesman for the BBC refused to comment.
Of course a spokesman for the BBC refused to comment. What the fuck did you think anyone was going to say about this? Was an official spokesman really going to come out and say: "Actually, isn't it? Ooh. The cow! And he's no better! I mean, really..." or even "We deplore people having private lives and would prefer it if every single pitiful ruddy detail of everything they ever did was reported to the wider world, like anyone even cares." Or maybe they were hoping for "Yes, we've sacked them both. Bastards. How dare they do this, whatever it is that they're supposed to have done, either of them."
So in one sense it's a pointless journo story, not of any interest to anyone other than fellow pros - and even then I should imagine it's fairly tedious. In another, there's a whiff of the anti-BBC agenda, though I probably wouldn't make too much of that in this instance. And in another, you could see it as exactly the kind of waste of time and money the Mail so often rails against. What if that BBC spokesman had to be contacted out of hours, for example, costing the Beeb - and us - valuable overtime? I do hope the Tax Payers Alliance have been informed.
*Addendum* I can understand the accusation, if it's brought out here, that by posting about something so pointless, I'm being as - if not more - pointless by doing so. I don't really have a defence to that, except to say that I hope at the very least I don't give any trace of legitimisation to this kind of pointlessness by being pointless myself. Not that that counts for anything anyway. But I just wanted you to know, yes, I had thought that myself. And rejected it and thought, no fuck it, I'll write about it anyway.
Strictly creepy stalking
Just what the hell is it with the Mail and Natalie Cassidy? No aspect of the ex-EastEnders actress's life is allowed to be free from scrutiny, as today's pointless piece of utter shite masquerading as celebrity 'news' shows:
Natalie Cassidy stocks up on ready meals between rehearsals
No. Oh my god. She's been... stocking up on ready meals, you say? Well why haven't the police been informed of this? What about Parliament - shall they be hauled back in for an emergency session to discuss the situation? HUMAN BEING IN EATS FOOD TO STAY ALIVE SHOCKER! Tell us more, Mr Mail. Tell us more details of your shocking investigation!
Natalie Cassidy is spending her waking hours living and breathing dancing.
So much so that it seems the Strictly Come Dancing contestant hasn't got time to spare slaving away over the kitchen hob.
There follows a creepily stalkerish photo of the woman concerned walking around a fucking supermarket with a basket of shopping and then a close-up of the fucking shopping basket - this really is revelatory stuff, isn't it? People go to supermarkets to buy things! Who knew? Who knew that was what happened in life? Next they'll be telling us she breathes air and goes to the toilet!
She popped into a branch of Marks and Spencer and filled her basket with pre-prepared dishes of salad, vegetables, pasta, stir fry and wholemeal bread rolls.
How dare the bitch! How dare she buy preprepared salad! She's worse than fucking Hitler for doing that. And wholemeal bread rolls... how can she sleep?
Uponnothing pointed out last week that while the Mail often tackles the subject of bullying, it's still happy to maintain its bizarre campaign against Cassidy. For this is just the latest in a long, long line of pointlessly banal yet somehow sniping stories at the actress, who has committed the horrific crime, it would appear, of not being the perfect weight, or shape, or class, or appearance for the Mail's liking. You can see the venom dripping from the fangs in today's story:
Yo-yo dieter Natalie previously slimmed down to a size 8.
But she later admitted she had been eating unhealthily to sustain her slender size after failing to keep up with her exercise routine.
Ah, there comes the barely disguised hatred. And why do we think she might have become a yo-yo dieter... pressure from the tabloids saying she was horrible and fat, by any chance? Long-lens pictures of her on the beach with nasty sniping comments underneath? Complete bastards judging her from afar, perhaps? Who knows. But let's look back at the Mail's stalking of Cassidy and see if we can find any clues.
September 29: Natalie goes to the gym. (To the fucking gym! The bitch!) Daily Mail reporter can't help growling: "the ex-EastEnders actress looked a far cry from her glammed-up appearances on Strictly Come Dancing."
September 23: Natalie goes to rehearsals for television programme in which she is appearing. Daily Mail reporter roars disapproval that the paparazzo who snapped her managed to get a photo making her top look more sheer than it really does: "But she didn't seem concerned about the embarrassing faux pas as she smiled for photographers." How dare she smile at the people making money out of pointing and laughing at her!
September 19: Natalie leaves house to go somewhere. Today it's the headline writer's turn to get the claws out, screaming: "Natalie Cassidy prepares for her big night... let's hope her outfit is more flattering than yesterday."
September 18: Natalie walks down the road. Daily Mail Reporter can't help questioning her choice of footwear this time, bellowing: "Natalie Cassidy looked in danger of sustaining an injury before even setting foot on the Strictly Come Dancing dancefloor. The former EastEnder, 26, stepped gingerly from her north London home to a waiting car in a pair of high heeled ankle boots."
September 10: Natalie gets in and out of a car. Luckily a pap photographer is there to take photos of her outfit in order for Daily Mail Reporter to take aim and fire: "In by far her most unflattering outfit to date, the actress emerged from a gym session last week wearing a sheer lycra leotard that tied around the middle and leggings which looked a size too small." Good god! Leggings a size too small! And this kind of crime goes unpunished in Broken Britain! Why aren't the police out arresting actresses for wearing leggins a size too small!
September 7: Natalie walks along the road. Daily Mail Reporter can't help giving with one hand and taking away with the other, combining positive comments about her appearance with a dig at her personal life: "She has been looking fresh-faced and slimmer than usual in recent weeks as she trains for the show, which starts on Friday, September 18. However, she has also had to contend with rumours of a Strictly romance with dancer Vincent Simone, her partner on the show." Slimmer than usual! The bitch! But she's probably fucking some other bloke than her boyfriend!
September 5: Natalie arrives for rehearsals for a TV programme in which she's taking part. But the long-lens photos are merely window-dressing for yet another bitchy attack by Daily Mail Reporter, who says: "In recent years, the actress has attracted attention for her dramatic weight loss after filming a workout DVD and subsequent weight gain." How dare she have done that! The evil woman! She lost weight and then filmed a DVD and then put the weight back on! Evil! Evil!
And that's just September. I have no idea what Cassidy has done to deserve this kind of pestering attention from the Mail - who aren't alone in this, it must be said, sharing their disgrace with the neon-coloured shitrags you see in doctors' waiting rooms - but she's stuck with it. Everywhere she goes, there are cameras, and when there are cameras, there will be the bitchy little comments. I'm surprised she ever leaves the house.
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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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