By Judi McLeod ——Bio and Archives--July 15, 2013
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“DM's headlines get worse. "Protests erupt across US after George Zimmerman goes free for killing unarmed boy with bag of sweets." Some bag of sweets! - Robert , Altrincham, United Kingdom, 14/7/2013 19:06 “As an American living in the UK, I have longed to move home to raise my kids in america. Now I’m not sure. Apparently it’s legal to shoot unarmed teenaged boys just walking home.” What a scary place america has become. Chariar, South Hampton, 14/7/2013 19:01.(Guess Chariar forgot overseas that the first letter in his home country starts with a capital ‘A’.) Given the passions it unnecessarily provoked, the Daily Mail’s read-the-whole-story-in-the-headlines piece was the equivalent, figuratively speaking of lobbing a bomb at America from across the pond. “Protests spread across the country Sunday in a second day of demonstrations in the wake of the sensational not-guilty verdict for George Zimmerman after he shot dead unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin.” (Daily Mail, July 15, 2001). “Demonstrations, from Florida where the trial took place to Atlanta, DC and New York, remained largely peaceful, though Los Angeles protesters managed to shut down an entire freeway and thousands of New Yorkers mobbed Times Square and blocked traffic for an hour. “Emotional crowds screamed 'Justice for Trayvon' and carried signs that likened the struggle of the slain teen and his supporters to that of the original civil rights movement.” The British newspaper is quick off the mark to portray America as a racist country where teenagers armed only with a bag of sweets are deliberately shot dead on their way home. Not everything runs smoothly in Queen Elizabeth II’s United Kingdom. Four years ago the Daily Mail was reporting on the anger after Paul Clarke, a former soldier, arrested after handing in a sawn-off shotgun, was given a suspended sentence, when he should have received an award instead. Clarke had spotted a black binliner in his back garden earlier in the year and discovered it contained a 20 gauge double-barrelled gun. “When he took it to a police station four days later, he was shocked to be arrested for possessing the firearm. “He was found guilty of that offence by a jury last month, but claims his arrest was a ‘stitch-up’ by police. “Clarke said today that he failed to call 999 when he found the gun because he had suffered ‘harassment’ from Surrey Police over a relationship he was having with a female detective. “He told Reading Crown Court: “I was sleeping with a detective from Reigate and I think another officer got a bit jealous and I’d had a bit of harassment since then.’ In Britain, the minimum sentence for possessing a firearm is normally five years, but Judge Christopher Critchlow admitted it was a ‘highly unusual’ case. “Instead, he gave Clarke a 12-month sentence, suspended for one year, and put him under a one-night curfew from 8 p.m. tonight until 7am tomorrow.” The British media has been on the forefront of reporting news the American media refuses to cover. But stoking the fires of racial unrest, a serious business, makes it easy to forget that coverage. Today’s Daily Mail headline proves that British tabloids have not come too far from what they were once called: “The Penny Dreadfuls”.
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