Express apologises to Cherie Blair

The Daily Express has published the following apology to Cherie Blair:

In our 5 November 2010 article “Burkha ‘no more a threat than a nun’s habit’ says Cherie” we reported that Cherie Blair had, in a speech to Muslim women, defended the wearing of the Burkha and that this was a change from her previously stated opposition to the Burkha and to full-face veils.

In fact, Mrs Blair spoke in support of Muslim women’s right to wear their traditional hair cover which leaves the face uncovered. We accept that Mrs Blair made no comment about the Burkha and her views on face coverings had not changed. We apologise to Mrs Blair for this error and any confusion caused.

Mail apologises to Cherie Blair

On Monday, the Daily Mail apologised to Cherie Blair over a story they published a year ago:

On 26 November [2009], in referring to a magazine's claim that Cherie Blair had attended a shooting party which included Saif Gaddafi, we suggested this was hypocritical and had outraged the families of victims of the Lockerbie bombing.

We accept that Mrs Blair did not attend the shooting party and has never met Mr Gaddafi. We apologise for any embarrassment caused.

Blair instructed lawyers in March about the article, which had the headline 'Outrage as Mandy goes on a country shoot with Gaddafi son (And, surprise, Cherie came too).'

The Press Gazette reported:

Associated Newspapers failed to provide a full and unequivocal apology, or even to give a substantive response to her complaint, [Blair] added.

It's not the first time the Mail has been accused of dragging its feet over a complaint.

And it's not the first time a newspaper apology has tried to shift blame to someone else. We were only 'referring to a magazine's claim' - don't blame us that we didn't check if it was correct before publishing it.

Mail tries to link Cherie Blair to Virginia Tech massacre

The Daily Mail is attacking two of its favourite hate figures - Cherie Blair and video games - in an entirely pathetic story with what appears to have no news value whatsoever.

Cherie Blair and her son join firm linked to violent computer game explains that she and son Nicky have become directors of a company called Magnitude Gaming.

The actual link between the firm and the 'violent computer game' Counter Strike seems very tenuous at best. The Mail explains that the company:

manage[s] semi-professional teams in the growing ‘e-sport’ world...The company has run a team playing the Counter-Strike combat game.

So it's not as if they designed or published the game, but simply run a team playing it (along with many other games, no doubt). Or did. The statement from company secretary Gabriel Moraes says:

‘Magnitude has never been involved with games containing any kind of street violence. We had one game involving soldiers in military combat but it had a rating of 18-plus and was a team game. We stopped involvement with that game some months ago.’

As the Blairs only became directors in February, it's likely there was only a few months overlap.

And then the two journalists who wrote the story, Brendan Carlin and Simon McGee, get to their main point:

There have been claims that perpetrators of massacres in the US and Germany have been fans of the game.

Ah. 'Claims'. How very definitive.

The 'claims' appear to have been made by serial trouble-maker Jack Thompson, who has made a living out of blaming video games for real-life violence. He linked the Virginia Tech shootings by Cho Seung-Hui to the game but failed to understand that:

• Cho didn't own any video games.
• Cho was never seen playing video games by his room-mate.
  
• Cho was a deeply disturbed young man with access to guns.

Thompson has also linked the game to another shooting at Northern Illinois University, where the perpetrator had played the game, but was also a former psychiatric patient who had stopped taking anti-depressant medication.

But back to Cherie and they try to make her sound like a hypocrite because she:

chaired a major inquiry into the growth of knife and gun crime on Britain’s streets which acknowledged the ‘dire consequences on some young people’ of the video games and films they watched.

But that is a very selective bit of cut-and-pasting. Here's the section in full in which that 'dire consequences' quote actually appears:

Finally, the broader cultural context in which young people live – the music they listen to, the films they watch, the video games and sports they play – are important in articulating values, defining what is ‘cool’ and fashionable and legitimising social norms.

Nevertheless, the impact that these cultural factors have on encouraging violence, desensitizing empathy and legitimising anti-social behaviour is contested.

Among the questions communities feel the need to address is why these factors impact with such dire consequences on some young people while others from the same background and subject to these same cultural influences have different aspirations and choose a lifestyle that does not reinforce their social exclusion.

That is the only section of the whole 121-page report which mentions video games - and appears on page 76. And it says any link is 'contested'. It is not a damning conclusion as the Mail tries to suggest.