Donkey Erection On Awards Shortlist

[Update at end of post]

After truly independent press regulator Impress was unceremoniously dumped as a sponsor of the British Journalism Awards 2016, Jonathan Heawood and his team may have felt more than a little put out. But after the past 48 hours’ events, they may be entitled to think themselves well out of a process which is becoming rapidly discredited.

On Monday, the 49 judges made public their decisions on who should be the finalists for the various awards on offer. And in the Politics Journalism category, as well as media establishment players like the BBC, Channel 4 News, the Telegraph, Observer and Times, came three players from digital media. These were BuzzFeed UK, Vice News, and, inexplicably, the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog.

Quite apart from the inconvenient fact that Staines and his gofers wouldn’t be able to spot journalism if it jumped up and kicked them in their collected undercarriages, there was also their track record of talking well, and lying badly. This was particularly important as the two names in the frame are Staines, and his newly anointed teaboy Alex “Billy Liar” Wickham. This less then dynamic duo have been shortlisted for their pretence that the Labour Party suddenly came over all anti-Semitic as it changed leaders last year.

It gets worse: The Great Guido yesterday showed why his presence will turn the British Journalism Awards into a laughing stock with the certainty of night following day as he posted an item titled “Woman Sucks Donkey C*ck On Guardian Front Page” (for some reason, Staines and his pals seem to think that “Cock” is equivalent in the “strong language” stakes to a certain fer-fer-fer-four letter word. What silly c-c-c-c-clots).

The post told “The Guardian have been made to look an ass after a third-party advertising network posted a photo of a woman performing oral sex on a donkey on the front page of their website. Guido has pixellated the image above. Expecting kickback, the Guardian appear to have now closed down all third party network ads on their site. Mule’ll be sorry if you’re the ad network responsible”. Laugh? I thought I’d never start.

As Political Scrapbook pointed out, “Guido Fawkes doesn’t seem to realise that third-party ads are usually tailored to the reader’s own browsing history … And we called the Guardian digital team to confirm: no, they haven’t taken third-party ads off their site … This is better than the time Louise Mensch didn’t know how Twitter search worked, and blamed Corbyn supporters for anti-semitism”. And now it’s got a lot worse.

Because Dominic Ponsford and his 49 wise men and women have, between them, elevated this shower to sit at the same table at proper journalists, the kind who get their stories right before rushing to publish. The British Journalism Awards have effectively put a donkey erection on their shortlist. And that is why Jonathan Heawood and the folks at Impress can consider themselves well out of this particular farce.

The award for Politics Journalism goes to … no, don’t laugh. Another fine mess.

[UPDATE 11 November 1115 hours: in another serious embarrassment for the British Journalism Awards, the Fawkes rabble have today committed another faux pas, as a direct result of their obsession with Guardian bashing.

Telling the world "Guardian Journalist Tweets Presidential Assassination Call, Deletes Account", The Great Guido claims "On electon [sic] night the Guardian’s Monisha Rajesh tweeted a call for a presidential assassination".

There was only one problem with this claim: Ms Rajesh works, or perhaps after this morning's round of sackings, that should be worked, at the Telegraph.

How's that shortlisting going for you Press Gazette people? Another fine mess, once again]