h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Precisely,

The only story I want to see on the TV or in the press is that of The First Sea Lord.


Novo
(blackcat>

What is the problem with them selling their story? I'm honestly asking.

Sure, it's a given that a "made-for-tv" movie will be horribly innacurate. But that's pretty much all TV, isn't it?

I've had a couple of jobs where I've been paid for interviews by the media or for writing articles, but because I carried out this work in the course of my employment any money I received had to be handed over to the organisation that was employing me.

Hi Arnie,

If you need to ask ,you probably wouldn't understand the answer...

Novo

Cannot really see how a faecestous response like that moves on the debate Novo. If you think selling the stories is "A bad thing" why not explain your reasoning.

For my I object because I think it commodifies sevice personnell doing their jobs. I feel that just because it was a "televisual media event" does not mean it is a special story, because it cheapens the suffinerng of my wounded or killed soldiers who suffered much more but don't get to sell their stories for six figure sums....

Over to you.

"Couldn't let us profit, wouldn't be civilized..."

Thanks FB, that makes sense. So if it were someone working for a private organization you would have less of an objection then?



Novo, aren't you perpetually banging on about lack of mutual respect, politeness of debate, etc.? I guess you don't buy into the whole "lead by example" thing?

Hi Arnie,

I should not have expected you to pick up on the fact that my 'uickie' was a rerun of an old joke about a chap pestering a man in a Rolls Royce dealership in Oxford Street, who kept asking the price of various models.

The exasperated reply was ~"If you need to ask , sir, you probably cannot afford it"

However , I apologise for my bad manners and lack of respect

As for selling their stories, it smacks too much of Oprah and similar shows on less than prime time TV. It isn't the way we tend to be, especially when other - still serving - personnel may well have more harrowing tales they could sell for cash. Come to that they are doubtless many peiople soldiering on within difficult lives, who would never think of baring their souls for money.

It is an entirely personal view that this form of " I'll tell it for cash" is a grubby form of journalism which I don't expect from our armed services.

Would you be happy for the detainees at Guantanamo ( if and when released ) to tell their stories to Al Jazeerah for money?

Novo

Novo, I agree with everything you're saying, up to a point. I completely agree that it "is a grubby form of journalism" and "it smacks too much of Oprah and similar shows on less than prime time TV."

But I also feel like preventing it is being too restrictive. I don't have to watch it - I choose not to. I never have.

For non-military, I don't see a quantifiable, tangible harm that it does, so I don't see why it should be restricted. (I can see how in the military it could affect morale).

I do agree it is undignified, etc. I guess the main thing is that in the US, dignity, etc. are much less respected/valued than in the UK (look for example at the difference in the libel/slander laws). And hence my take that if someone wants to take the "made-for-tv" route, well, that's their choice - what they're doing isn't any worse than what's been done already (in the US).

Arnie I think an awful lot of snobbery goes on in the UK about the 'common man/soldier'. Most of the people I saw whiniging about it on TV here were ex commander so and so, or major general wotsit. These people all earn a fair wack and are used to viewing the ordinary soldioer as cannon fodder. What they don't like is that such people may now earn a bit of extra money for being put in harms way, rather than just getting some silly medal for laying down the their lives.

Another sort of person who whines and bleats about it here in the UK, is the same person who shouts, 'Viva Capitalism' from the roof tops. Well if you want free market Capitalism, stop bleating about ordinary people taking advantage of it via the mass media which is a product of it.

Arnie, hypocrisy is the great British disease.!!!!

Same thing happens in the US, it's called being "Republican". They're all for corporate welfare, but the skies are falling if you try to help a single mother. So I don't think the British have a monopoly on hypocrisy.

Good morning Arnie,

By way of a further apology for my bad manners , take a look at the picture in this link, don't bother with the text........

<< http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6547167.stm >> this picture, or one very similar has appeared in the national press today with the sub heading

" They can't sell their stories can they ( Mr Blair )?"

I am not suggesting that is good taste either, but in spite of Fanny's linkage between political ideals and general feeling, that phrase says something about the indignation here, at the (now reversed) decision to let the captives tell there stories for cash.

Novo

Bliar did his usual thing, whenever he cocks up, of getting aggressive saying 'Yes, it was a mistake. We will learn from it. Now, lets draw a line udner it and move on.' In an annoyed tone that makes out that he is fed up with the unwarranted focus on such matters when there are more important things to deal with.

So, he hasn't changed.

Morning Novo,

This is the most critical leader I have ever read in the Financial Times:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/edb8bd46-e7a9-11db-8098-000b5df10621.html

I have been saying this for years:

"Mr Browne and the MoD have fallen into the trap – too commonplace today – of ****confusing victims with heroes.****"

The 3,000 people who died in the World Trade Centre Terrorist attack on 11/9/01 were victims not heroes...even though they keep being called 'heroes'.

You aren't a hero when you die sitting at your desk supping your first coffee of the day or having a building collapsing on you when you are 100yards from the exit.

Morning WA

Thanks for that.

It only goes to reinforce my already very low opinion of the MoD and it's political masters.

The Roman army must have felt something akin when the Empire fell apart.

Novo

Actually, I'm feeling a little sorry for the sailor's who have sold their story...


Lets face it, they won't have made enough money to quit their day-jobs, they're undoubtedly going to feel extremely uncomfortable about the whole thing when they've got to face their shipmates and, in my opinion, they've been 'used' by the politicians.

My take on this whole affair is that, given the continuing attempts to vilify Iran for absolutely everything they can (despite the constant bleating that Iran is the bad guy behind every explosion in Iraq, I've yet to see anyone produce any firm evidence), some politico somewhere decided that if they were to gently push these sailors in the direction of the tabloids then they'd get some excellent free publicity in their war of words against Iran.

People in this thread have complained about common soldiers being treated like expendable pawns by their military leaders... In this case I think they were shuffled around the board by their political leaders.

I notice that the youngest guy in the group, the only other person to have sold his story, has already apologised for his actions and regrets what he's done.

My take on it is that the two who sold their stories weren't thinking about the bigger picture of what they were doing - and the politicians who pointed them at the tabloids were using them to take a cheap shot at Iran.

Agreed.

Novo

This is absolutely fascinating to me - just b/c it is the polar opposite of what would happen in the US. I'm not saying I support the way the US is, it's just really opened my eyes that another way exists/is feasible.


I wonder, what if the sailors each (or collectively) wrote a book and sold that? How would posters here feel about that?

>>I wonder, what if the sailors each (or collectively) wrote a book and sold that? How would posters here feel about that?<< Arnie

I'd say good on them. I heard so many horror stories from my grandad who signed up for WW1 as a virtual child, about the way ordinary soldiers were treated by the dumbo public school officer class, to always feel an instinctive anger with the establishment who play on the trust, guts and pride of the ordinary soldier. I've visited Gallipolli which has row upon row of graves of young men around the age of 20. Who sent them to a pointless death? The officers.

So good on those sailorsif they wrote an honest book about what really happened. Whether they'd be allowed is another matter.