Gazza – Mail Troll Hypocrisy

Following the Mirror’s discovery that ex-footballer Paul Gascoigne had once again fallen off the wagon and had been admitted to hospital after being found in a drunken state outside his apartment, the rest of the press piled in, not out of any sense of concern for his welfare, but to use him as a means of flogging a few more papers. The Daily Mail has now decided to use him a little more.

What's f***ing wrong with using a drunk to flog papers, c***?!? Er, with the greatest of respect, Mr Jay

In order to accomplish this dubious slice of less than quality journalism, the Dacre doggies have roped in Gazza’s step-daughter Bianca, whether she likes it or not: “Bianca Gascoigne hits out at Twitter trolls attacking her over step-father Paul's alcoholism after worrying drunken images as it is revealed he will be forced to leave his flat within weeks” shrieks the headline.

The artificially manufactured outrage continues “Step-daughter Bianca, 27, was seen at a premiere of the film Sin City 2 on Wednesday, the day before her step-father was seen clutching a bottle of gin as he staggered around outside his home. As the sad news about her step-father emerged this morning, vile trolls took to Twitter to mock the ex-footballer and blame glamour model Bianca”.

Yes, after an extensive in-depth investigation including the use of such state-of-the-art journalistic tools as, er, Twitter Advanced Search, the Mail found four accounts that had sent disapproving messages to Ms Gascoigne. One of these allegedly “vile trolls” had called her “attention seeking”, which, considering she is a model, could be nothing more than a statement of fact.

So this is a rather lame excuse to run the story for a second day, and, as for talking “trolls”, one has to ask the question: just who is doing the trolling here? Who is using this supposed concern for Bianca Gascoigne as an excuse for running a large photo of her – which, of course, would have been far less valuable in terms of papers sold and clicks on Mail Online had her stepfather not been all over the front pages?

Worse, who is it that is using the claim of “vile trolls” to recycle as many photos of the unfortunate Gazza as they can lay their hands on? There is precious little sensitivity in punctuating the narrative with ten – yes, ten – photos of him in an apparently dishevelled and disorientated state. And who is it that is dredging up Gazza’s past in every intimate detail, to include in their article?

That, Daily Mail and Mail Online people, would be you. The faux outrage at what, in Twitter terms, is nothing more than a few hotheads sounding off, has been leveraged in order to kick Paul Gascoigne when he is down. The use of all those photos of him at his lowest ebb merely underscores that fact. The Mail doesn’t give a flying foxtrot about Gazza, or his wider family. They’re just using them to flog papers.

Paul Dacre was paid £1.85 million last year. Every little prurient drivel helps.