Time To Close Down The Sun

Looking back on the events of 1989, when, under the less than benign editorship of the deeply unpleasant Kelvin McFilth, the Murdoch Sun alienated more or less the whole of Merseyside in the aftermath of the Hillsborough stadium disaster, the paper’s defenders would always tell anyone listening that it could never happen again. The paper had changed; today it has a woman editor. Alienating the readers could not happen again.

Two women were responsible for this front page ...

Well, one hates to come over all Neil Kinnock, but even with a woman editor - a woman editor - it has happened again, and Victoria Newton must have not only known about the latest horrendous gaffe, she will have signed off on it. Today, the Sun has legitimised domestic abuse, and specifically the kind of physical abuse that far too many men perpetrate on those they claim to love. And it’s done it on the front page.

... Sun editor Victoria Newton ...

Author and campaigner Jo Rowling had previously told that her first marriage had been an occasionally abusive one. So the Murdoch goons trooped off to Portugal - how they circumvented the country’s lockdown laws, which are of a magnitude stricter than those in the UK, is not told - tracked down her first husband, got some suitably inflammatory comments out of him, and gave over today’s front page to them.

... and News UK CEO Rebekah Brooks

“EXCLUSIVE … Sick Taunt Of Rowling’s Violent Ex … I SLAPPED JK AND I’M NOT SORRY … Sun Confronts Her 1st Husband”. Not on an inside page, not placed alongside contact details for women suffering in abusive relationships, not toned down to remove any kind of sensationalist leaning. He Done It And He’s Not Sorry.

How Ms Newton came to pass that one can only be imagined; perhaps the paper really is that desperate for sales and clicks. We already know that appallingly over-promoted News UK CEO Rebekah Brooks has told staff that there will be job losses at all the Murdoch titles in the UK. But desperation for sales is no excuse for legitimising domestic abuse.

Condemnation of this excuse for journalism has been as severe as predictable, with Joanna Cherry QC responding “Everyone who claimed [Jo Rowling] was ‘weaponising her abuse’ or ‘engaging in tired tropes’ etc. Should take a long hard look at the Sun’s front page & accept that their dismissal of women’s #sexbasedrights has fuelled a tsunami of #misogyny which has to stop”. Carole Cadwalladr had seen it all before.

“This is hateful. But it isn't just the Sun. Why on earth did it think it could get away with this? Because it's everywhere. Every day we swim in a cesspit of violent misogyny on here & we do nothing about it. It's not called out, it's not banned, it carries no consequences”. Former prosecutor Nazir Afzal added “We don’t need to hear the words of JK Rowling’s abuser nor his lack of remorse. It’s the victims we need to hear from, not those who would silence them”. Yorkshire Post editor James Mitchinson despaired of the spectacle.

“My reporters, sadly, attend court hearings regularly where domestic violence is raked over. Never, EVER, would I blast up the perpetrator's defence. Especially a boastful lack of contrition. If this is journalism, I'm starting to think I'm in the wrong job”. Professor Brian Cathcart of Kingston University mused “The Sun’s front page - giving a platform to an unrepentant abuser - is appalling even by its standards. Those responsible are editor Victoria Newton, her boss Rebekah Brooks and her boss Rupert Murdoch. They are beneath contempt. Please #dontbuythesun And don’t click either.”

And Ed Wood expressed his disgust in straightforward and forthright terms. “The Sun and their poison can fuck the fuck off. Instead of sharing their front page, let’s share the details for Refuge”. Yes, let’s share those details. There they are.

The Sun suffered an irreversible decline in its circulation after Hillsborough. It deserves to suffer another, and greater, such decline after publishing that front page. It should from now on be treated as a pariah newspaper. Because that is what it is.

The Murdoch mafiosi have ventured beyond the pale once too often. Don’t buy the Sun.

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