by Judi McLeod
april 5, 2004
My friends Peter Worthington and Bob MacDonald, on the job since Day One, never thought the Toronto Sun would have come to this. as of this Monday, models, more models, scantily clad girls and entertainment predominate pages in what publisher and CEO Neil Fowler calls a "brighter Sun".
Blimey, Mr. Fowler is the same newspaper that forced the Sunshine Girl to the back pages just a few years back?
according to the CEO who blew in from Merry Old England little more than a year ago, the Sun’s new format was in the works for the past six months. a new formula was devised "that will epitomize what a great newspaper should be like in the 21st century."
Sounds like the words of a city hall politician and a lot more noble than the path back to England’s penny dreadfuls that the Sun now seems to be taking.
Neil Fowler wasn’t there when the Sun first published in November 1971 and began building a reputation as a feisty, fearless newspaper with reporters willing to get in the face of any stuffed shirt. Neither were Fowler’s Quebecor big bosses. But Worthington and MacDonald were.
We hear rumours over at Canada Free Press that regular columns will be downsized and even reduced, period. We hope not, as these journalistic giants can titillate in a way much more meaningful than any bevy of models can do.
So move your "sports to start from the inside back cover, reinvent lifestyle into mew special sections on health, food, fashion, relationships and homes."
It’s your claim of "brilliant entertainment and features" and "entertainment (that) will become even more the ultimate guide to night life and going out in the GTa" that worries some readers.
an obsession with more entertainment news only means that the feisty Sun will be caving in to the growing trend of newspapers covering pop culture. The brand of perfume JLo chooses in her next switcheroo and Dido dying herself blonde isn’t real news to many.
Metro, which took over the TTC crowd, has a newspaper that captures subway readers with headlines. Some subway riders would rather have something to look at rather than fellow commuters. But Metro takes no editorial stand. although only weekly, both Now and Eye provide the "ultimate guide to night life and going out in the GTa" in equal doses.
"From more nostalgia to great new writers, there will be much more in your Sun, according to Fowler.
But writers like Worthington and Macdonald and others have to be there to live up to Fowler’s promises about "nostalgia," and I somehow get the feeling that they won’t be.
I never really left the Sun when I departed so many years ago. Even though I was elsewhere, it remained so much a part of my life. Memories of Sun days with Barbara amiel, Dani Crittenden, editors Sean McCann, Ed Monteith will always walk with me.
Original Sun publisher Doug Creighton, not long gone, must be rolling in his grave and the inimitable cartoonist andy Donato must have itchy feet.
The good old days, wonderful as they were, may be easily washed away by the tide of pop culture, but the bylines of the Sun’s truly unique columnists will never be erased by scores of Sun readers.
It’s time to resurrect the red and white t-shirts that sent out a message when the Sun was about to be bought out by the Toronto Star: "S.O.S: Save Our Sun."
Canada Free Press founding editor Most recent by Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the print media. Her work has appeared on Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, Glenn Beck. Judi can be reached at: judi@canadafreepress.com
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