Mail Aggression Creeps Out Angela Rayner

Meeting Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner on the campaign trail, you see quickly and clearly that she connects with voters, that they warm to her, that there is an ease about her, no side, nothing is put on for the cameras. Taken alongside her ability to dismantle alleged Prime Minister Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson across the Dispatch Box, this makes the Tories, and indeed their press pals, scared shitless of her.

Yes, this actually got written, approved - and published

Thus both Tories and press resort to smearing, to take her down by whatever means they deem necessary. Should they succeed, the end will be considered to have justified the means. Unfortunately for those going on the attack, the latest crude slice of misogyny has fallen some way short of success, while inducing revulsion across the political spectrum.

Glen Owen, clearly overjoyed at his latest handiwork

It fell to the increasingly wayward Mail on Sunday to administer today’s smear, and unlike the leering attack on Theresa May and Nicola Sturgeon, where Sarah “Vain” Vine was somehow persuaded to have her name appear on the by-line, it seems no female hack was prepared to follow suit. So it is attributed to Glen Owen, the MoS political editor.

Evening all

The headline tells why this may herald the nadir of Owen’s less than stellar career: “Stone the crows! Tories accuse Rayner of Basic Instinct ploy to distract Boris”. Notice who gets the surname name check, and who gets first name recognition. Woman wears skirt and on occasion crosses legs shock horror. It’s puerile, misogynist, and plain creepy.

What's my f***ing photo doing here, c***?!?!?

We need not be concerned with the rest of this deeply unpleasant attack, save to note one thing: the article did not just appear in today’s print edition. It will have been signed off, implicitly or otherwise, by a whole host of editing staff, and more than likely will have been approved not only by senior editors like Ted Verity, but also by the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre. This is not merely one rogue reporter. It is a culture of misogynist aggression.

Female and Male, left and right, inside and outside politics, have condemned the attack. Like Kate McCann from TalkTV. “You see all those female MPs and journalists tweeting their rage at this story? It’s because nearly every single one of us has experienced something like this in the course of doing our jobs - often repeatedly - and we are utterly, utterly sick of it”. Gary Neville: “An obscene article”. Dan Walker: “Get in the bin”.

James O’Brien of LBC mused “So Boris Johnson is a vulnerable & pitiable victim of his own well-documented sexual incontinence while Angela Rayner is a brazen temptress because she has legs. Surely the cheapest, most misogynistic horror show to appear in a British newspaper since Kelvin MacKenzie had a job”. Yes, it was that bad.

Meanwhile, Adam Ramsay drew the obvious conclusion: “If Boris Johnson is incapable of doing his job with women in the room then Boris Johnson is incapable of doing his job”. And Caroline Wheeler of the Sunday Times reminded us what the MoS wasn’t telling its readers: “Three cabinet ministers and two shadow cabinet ministers are among more than 50 MPs facing allegations of sexual misconduct”. Fifty of them. FIFTY.

It was the MoS’ daily stablemate that told us we should not dwell on Partygate because there were more important issues facing the country. That line didn’t age well.

And don’t expect IPSO to even say peep. That’s our free and fearless press for you.

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