As a History student, quite often I get the job of rifling through (old) newspapers - usually online- tediously looking for the right quote to support a point. I usually enjoy reading vintage articles along the way, but whilst reading something as shocking as an english translation of Nazi Germany's hideously anti semitic Der Sturmer, it can be quite easy to want to lose focus. My latest essay is also on the uses and limitations of newspapers; as far as I can ascertain there are no uses, and there are no limitations - they are yin and yang, cheese and onion, one. Just like news itself, there isn't any absolutist point of being correct.
Today's big news is obviously the student riots that took place yesterday, with particular reference towards the vandalism that took place on Prince Charles and Camilla's private car. The son of one member of Pink Floyd took it upon himself to stand on the Cenotaph (he has today publicly apologised; probably because Daddy told him too - Ironic as you would think 'Another Brick in the Wall' would commend his 'revolutionary' attitude). Students say the Met Police were too heavy handed. The Met Police say the Students were demanding trouble. And on and on it goes; today, every single paper has the same image on its cover - Camilla is clearly shaken and ol' Charlie is gripping onto her hand (a far cry from the days of him and Diana, where he begrudgingly agreed he was in love with her, 'Whatever that is'; this is true love). The students have also been reported as chanting 'Off with their heads'. These people either like the new Alice in Wonderland a little too much, or they're not history students - (a monarch no longer rules and reigns, so really, unless we go to war or kill a swan, the Royals have nothing to do with daily life.) but all of them would have to agree, that this was a touch too far. In fact, I would say smashing The Treasury's windows, having the stomach to deface Sir Winston Churchill's statue (but not the guts to show your face) and stomping all over the Cenotaph was already a bit heavy handed, but that's fine. After all, let's show our maturity to the Government (because someday in the next 20 years, these students may well be the Government) by destroying Britain's history.
This just shows that the old saying 'No such thing as bad press' can't be true; today there are a lot of people being publicly humiliated or commended, being discussed and disgusting and of course, again... None of them are wrong.
Not to themselves anyway.
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