Daily Mail Island

Inspired by the docufilm Super Size Me (where a diet of only McDonald's shit was consumed), a Guardian writer, Nick Angel has read only the DM for a month. The results can be see here. sometimes the Guardian justs make you want to make love to it. This is not always recommended as the ink is notoriously likely to come off.




A few excerpts are worthy of inclusion:



Millions of its inhabitants are malnourished, and danger lurks in seemingly innocent places - like milk, bread, and garden sprays. Ponies - yes, ponies - are slaughtered for the gastronomic pleasure of the country's neighbours. A Stasi-style surveillance state is secretly plotting to turn them all vegetarian, and to top it all there's even a Wicked Witch who - until very recently - exerted a malign influence over the nation's ruler.


And then came the next trial: actually buying the newspaper. As I entered my newsagent's on the first morning, my mouth struggled to form the words, "Daily Mail, please." It was as embarrassing as asking for haemorrhoid cream, and I realised how loaded your choice of newspaper is. If the Mail were a car, it would be a 4x4.


Most striking of all, a few days before the end of the experiment I realised that I had stopped worrying about global warming. For the Mail, it barely exists an issue - and certainly not as something to frighten us with - and this, surely, is the secret of the paper's success. Phantom menaces are given prominence over real ones. The anger it stirs requires no action, no moral or intellectual effort, but simply confirms existing prejudices. By painting the world as a dystopia, we cling to our own cosy certainties.


The comments section produced a couple of gems too.


How do you confuse a DM reader? Tell him asylum seekers kill paedophiles! Classic.


There is also reference to a Daily Mail Headline generator produced by a Chris Applegate, which can be found here. His blog is also worth a look. Go on, you know you want to!






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