Reviews Category
We don’t just report off-beat news, breaking news and digest the best and worst of the news media analysis and commentary. We give an original take on what happened and why. We add lols, satire, news photos and original content.
The Spencer West Story in photos
SPENCER West had his legs amputated when he was five. At age 31 he climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro – walking on his hands for 80% of the trek:
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Posted: 22nd, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
Tabloids say skunk smoker mistook pylon for bridge: what really happened
DID you hear about the Czech woman who, having smoked cannabis, mistook an electricity pylon for a bridge? She climbed it. The Daily Mail says the woman spent “four hours smoking super-strength ‘skunk’ cannabis“. She was “hallucinating“.
The Sun agrees, stating that the woman from Zlin, Czech Republic smoked skunk and mistook a pylon for a bridge. The Sun gets identifies her as a “21-year-old girl”.
The Mirror notes that the “girl” was wearing a “tiny pair of denim hotpants and a t-shirt.”
All papers quote “police spokesman Jan Macalikova”, who says:
“It was a nightmare because she was very much under the influence of drugs and wasn’t making much sense….She received treatment at hospital for her drugs consumption but was otherwise unhurt. She’s lucky she didn’t get a new high – high voltage.”
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Summer Solstice 2012 in photos: Stone Henge and other trees
IT’S June 21, which means it’s time for Britain Summer Solstice. Time, then, to head off to Stonehenge, Wiltshire, to dance in the moist air and live life as it once was on Salisbury Plain, before electricity was harnessed and light was enabled at the flick of a switch. Humanity is great. We even hug trees:
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People gather during the summer solstice at Stonehenge, near Salisbury Thursday, June 21, 2012. Rain-sodden crowds welcomed a spectacularly rainy summer solstice at Stonehenge in true British fashion Thursday: With stoicism and wit. But through the wind and rain, drummers inside the ancient stone circle kept up their thumping rhythm, new age pagans kept up their chaotic dance, and visitors kept up their sense of humor. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis)
Posted: 21st, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
Nominative Determinism: Team GB Olympian Robbie Grabarz poses for gay mag
NOMINATIVE determinism of the day takes in the London Olympics. A Team GB high jumper has posed for Attitude magazine, the gay organ. His name? Why, it’s Robbie Grabarz…
Posted: 21st, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
The Sun uses Tony Nicklinson to attack the ‘bullying’ BBC – the Twerps
THE Sun calls BBC West Midlands radio host Adrian Goldberg an “insensitive” bully for mistakenly tweeting “twerp” instead of “tweep”.
The non-story is based on Tony Nicklinson, who has locked-in syndrome. He says his life is “dull, miserable, demeaning, undignified and intolerable“. He wants to end it. He wants anyone who helps him die – his condition means he cannot kill himself – not to be prosecuted. His case has reached the High Court, where men who are not suffering and do not know what it feels like to be Tony Nicklinson, will determine if he should live on.
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Posted: 20th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 2 Comments
Flashback: The most 1980s photos ever
FLASHBACK to September 12 1985: “Rock singer Boy George touches up his makeup while tablemates Brooke Shields and rock singer George Michael are deep in conversation at the Palladium disco in New York on Wednesday, Sept. 12, 1985.” This might be the one of the Top 10 1980s photo ever…
Posted: 20th, June 2012 | In: Flashback | 0 Comments
This1950s film warns boys to be wary of homosexuals
FLASHBACK features this public service announcement warning boys about homosexuals. This is 1950s America, after the war against the Nazis had been won. Still, in the USA – Land of the Free – homophobia was State sanctioned. We’ve come a long way, baby:
Posted: 20th, June 2012 | In: Flashback | 3 Comments
Boston atheist vows to defy police and display poster stating all religion is fairy stories
JOHN Richards, of Boston, Lincolnshire, has been told that he faces arrests if his post decrying relgions as “fairy stories” causes offence. Because anything can cause offence to those who seek it out, Mr Richards is doomed.
According to Lincolnshire Police, the 1986 Public Order Act states that “a person is guilty of an offence if they display a sign which is threatening or abusive or insulting with the intent to provoke violence or which may cause another person harassment, alarm or distress.”
That nonsense is followed by the police’s laughable lines:
“This is balanced with a right to free speech and the key point is that the offence is committed if it is deemed that a reasonable person would find the content insulting.”
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Posted: 20th, June 2012 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | 2 Comments
10 best juxtaposed newspaper images ever (2)
JUXTAPOSED images of the day feature the paedophile priest, the dog hurter, the ferry jumper and the teen rapist… (The first batch is here.)
Posted: 20th, June 2012 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | 0 Comments
The Sounds of Silence, Seventies style censorship
THE re-release of the Sex Pistols’ God Save the Queen, 25 years after its last Jubilee disgrace, has set the cat among the pigeons once again.
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Posted: 19th, June 2012 | In: Flashback, Key Posts, Music | 1 Comment
Euro 2012 in photos: England players prepare for glory in Ukraine as fans make ready to party
ARE you ready for England v Ukraine in the big Euro 2012 decider? Ready, Roy Hodgson? Ready, Theo Walcott? Ready, Wayne Rooney? Ready, England fan dressed a militant Christian with broken arm? Ready, neo-Nazis thugs? Ready to jump in the fountain when Steven Gerrard’s team wins…?
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Posted: 19th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
Luka Magnotta goes home to Montreal: Jun Lin’s head is missing
LUKA MAGNOTTA is on his way to Canada. In Montreal, Magnotta will answer questions about the dismembering and cannibalising of Chinese student Jun Lin.
Says Ian Lafreniere, the Montreal police commander:
“This is not the end of the investigation. We’re missing an important part of the investigation which is the head of the body.”
Forgetting to add that Magnotta has not been found guilty of the grisly murder. The trial begins on Monday, when Magnotta will be in court..
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Posted: 19th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
Who killed the Lyminge, Kent, duck? The Speed Watch crew investigate
WHO killed the duck in rural Kent? When some motorists stopped to let a duck cross the road, a driver overtook and took out the bird. The killing was observed, apparently, by members of Speed Watch who tracks passing cars with speed recording devices and then pass on the speeding vehicles’ details to the police on the beat in Lyminge, Etchinghill and Rhodes Minnis.
Colin Manvell is the Lyminge Parish Council vice-chairman and Speed Watch coordinator. He tells media:
“Through places like Etchinghill, the roads are so narrow in places that if a car was going too fast and came across a bus it just wouldn’t stand a chance. We’ve got a lot of animals who live nearby and horse riders often come down this way too. A poor duck was killed recently when an impatient driver pulled out.”
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A message to suicide minded London Underground users
A MESSAGE to London Underground suerf om the what claims to be the Mayor of London’s office:
“KILL YOURSELF AT HOME – Don’t leave everyone hanging by selfishly topping yourself on the Underground. We’ve got places we need to be.”
Spotter: Charlotte Cramer
Who to blame for Gaza’s poisonous water?
THE BBC reports the grim news that water in Gaza is “too contaminated to drink“. DRinking waster has been contaminated by “fertiliser and human waste”. The BBC’s emphasis is on it being the fault of the Israelis:
The charities Save the Children and Medical Aid for Palestinians say the number of children being treated for diarrhoea has doubled in five years. They say Israel’s five-year blockade of the territory is preventing crucial sanitation equipment from getting in. The blockade must be lifted “in its entirety”, they say
Children are suffering. So. Stop the blockade? For many years, hollow metal pipes were crossing the aborder from Israel Gaza. In 2007, the Israeli secret service discovered that pipes earmarked for the sewage system in Gaza were being used to manufacture Kassam rockets and shoulder-launched missiles. Sewer piles have been used as weapons before.
The rockets are a problem.
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Posted: 18th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 8 Comments
Rodney King in photos: The man whose police beating shone a light on racism in Los Angeles
RODNEY King has died. King became famous when he was beaten up by those fine upstanding men of the Los Angeles Police Department in 1991. They clubbed him more than 50 times with their batons. King says the police told him, “We are going to kill you nigger.” An amateur cameraman filmed the merciless brutality. King, who had been drinking while out on parole, had tried to outrun the police. Realising it was futile, he pulled over. He got out of his car. He was unarmed.
When the all-white jury cleared the four all-white police officers of behaving illegally when they beat up the black man, riots erupted. The mayhem led to 53 deaths.
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Posted: 18th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
Martha Payne uses her school dinner blog to promote the Roman Catholicism in Africa
MARTHA Payne was doing it for a Christian charity. The nine-year-old blogger has so far raised £70,000 for charity after Argyll and Bute Council forbade her from posting photos of her Lochgilphead Primary school dinners on her blog and then, in the media spotlights, caved in.
Matha Payne is raising cash for school dinners in Malawi. She has taken the parental advice, that if the kids in Africa are starving they can have my revolting dinner, by raising enough money to feed the children over there.
Matha scores each meal on her “food-o-meter”, giving the mush a health rating. She then counts the number of mouthfuls she needs to eat it. When it’s peas and smoked haddock the mouthful count can top 23,000!
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Posted: 17th, June 2012 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | 8 Comments
Flashback to 1976: The Raleigh Grifter helps boys pull models
VINTAGE sex can sell anything advert of the day. It’s July 21 1976, The Press Association reports:
Adding a touch of glamour at a press preview of children’s bicycles from Raleigh, is model Cheryl Hersch from Chiswick, who takes to the saddle of the Raleigh Grifter, one of the new range, which was on show at Craven Cottage, the home ground of Fulham Football Club.
Get a push bike and pull a model, kids. (I had one of these bikes in silver. And, true enough, I was soon beating off glamour models with a stick.)
Posted: 17th, June 2012 | In: Flashback, The Consumer | 1 Comment
Luka Magnotta: He might have practiced for murder on his doll Barbie
LUKA Magnotta is in a cell in Berlin, awaiting extradition to Canada. The head of his alleged victim, Jun Lin, has not been found. So far, two hands and two feet from Lin’s body have arrived via the post at part two Vancouver schools, the Ottawa headquarters of the Conservative Party of Canada and another addressed to the country’s Liberal party was intercepted at the post office.
Montreal police Commander Ian Lafreniere tells media:
“The state of the body is so bad. It was cut. It was dismembered. This is a very hard case for us in terms of being extremely gross. We’re still missing body parts.”
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Posted: 17th, June 2012 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | 0 Comments
Turkey PKK trial: Mehmet Tahir Ilhan is the lemon Kurd
TO Turkey, where Mehmet Tahir Ilhan is in the dock. Ilhan is a Kurd in illegal possession of a lemon.
It’s alleged that Mehmet Tahir Ilhan, who is deaf and unable to speak, is in the business of producing propaganda for the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). The prosecutors wants him jailed for 25 years for supporting terrorism. Evidence? His lemon, which, we learn, can reduce the effects of tear gas.
Mr Ilhan says he was just unlucky to have been in the area when a pro-Kurdish demonstration turned violent.
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Posted: 17th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
In photos – the SuperNova SciFi and Pop Culture Expo
TO Australia’s SuperNova SciFi and Pop Culture Expo in Sydney to see a woman dressed as Jessica from Who Framed Rodger Rabbit?, the cast of Star Wars – the Student Union Years, and more wonders…
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Posted: 16th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
Dogging goes mainstream in Daily Mail’s This Is Sussex local newspaper
DOGGING has gone mainstream. Daily Mail sister paper The Kent and Sussex Courier (online: This is Sussex) features dogging in its top five tweets of the week. One day all newspapers will do is republish tweets. It’s the future of newsprint…
PS: The preceding tweet about a tough par 4 18th on the Crowborough greens is not thought to the related to the dogging tweet.
Spotter: Mike Marshall
Cumbria tribute to Derrick Bird’s victims placed below a massive gun
THE tribute in Seascale to Derrick Bird’s 12 victims is a £1,000 commemorative plaque declaring “In Memory Of All The Victims Of The WEST CUMBRIA SHOOTINGS 2nd June 1010”. Derrick Bird murdered 12 people in Cumbria on June 2, 2010.
The large lettering to the “WEST CUMBRIA SHOOTINGS” suggests shouting, turning the horror into less of a reason for community mourning that an exercise in PR.
Are we being oversensitive?
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Posted: 16th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
Spanish miners strike with homemade bombs while China shoots for the moon – photos
IN El Entrego near Oviedo, Spain, miners are striking over Government plans to reduce their state subsidies. The miners have been firing handmade rockets at riot police. Over in China, they’re firing rockets into space. The world is changing…The Economist has a good piece on Spanish bailout. The Euroapocalypse looms:
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Undercover miners are seen next to the road as they block the traffic during a protest in Cinera, near Leon, Spain, Monday, June 11, 2012. Strikes, road blockades, and mine sit-ins continue as 8,000 mineworkers at over 40 coal mines in northern Spain continue their protests against government action to cut coal subsidies. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)
Posted: 15th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
How Robin van Helsum became ‘Forest Boy’ (photos)
MEET Robin van Helsum from the Dutch city of Hengelo. It’s near to the German border. Robin van Helsum is 20. You might know him better as “Forest Boy”, who on September 5 2011, arrived at Berlin city hall telling local officials his name was Ray.
He said he’d been born on June 20, 1994. The only other details he shared were that his mother Doreen had died in a car crash, and that for the past five years he’d been living in the woods with Ryan, his father who had recently died. Ryan was buried “in a hole in the forest underneath some stones”. After burying Ryan, Ray just walked. And after five days he had arrived in Berlin.
Ray was soon housed in an institution.
Meanwhile, across the border in the Netherlands, Robin van Helsum was missing. His family had launched an appeal for information. But had Ray would not let the Germans issue photographs of him.
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Posted: 15th, June 2012 | In: Reviews | 0 Comments
