Paul Hopkins

For many years I have hated the Daily Mail, I very rarely read it but on the odd occasion I do I normally end up either incredibly angry due to its incredibly opinionated way of delivering the latest news stories or screaming at it due to its inaccuracies, normally in reporting some medical wonder drug or something along that line. I’m sure it’s not all bad but it just rubs me up the wrong way so I don’t make a habit of reading it!

Recently I’ve been really impressed by the 9 celebrities (and all the support staff) who have raised a huge amount of money by climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. All of them made it to the top which is some achievement. There is an argument that I hear people say ‘why don’t these celebrities just give money it would raise as much’. However, doing something amazing raises awareness of the charity as well as the money (I also wouldn’t be surprised if they all made generous donations as well).

How do the red nose climb and my hatred of the Daily mirror fit together. Well in this article, (I was reluctant to link to it but I think it’s worth a read). In my eyes Polly Graham comes across as an opinionated, arrogant bitch with an axe to grind. This is exactly the kind of story that makes me hate the Daily Mail. Why slate someone trying to do something good? As well as the written content the images used are interesting. There are 5 images from the climb in the article, 4 are credited to ‘Getty Images’, the official images, one from the mountain of Cheryl Cole is not credited to ‘Getty Images’. According to Chris Moyles on today’s show ‘Getty images’ were the official publicity photo provider for the trip and some of the money the papers paid to use the images went to Comic Relief – more money for charity, must be a good thing! Why then, use a picture that appears to be non official, taken by some unscrupulous paparazzi just in it for the money?

I’m not going to lower myself to the levels of Polly Graham and slag her off but I would like to now see her write a nice article about how they have all done an amazing job and I would like her to print an apology to Cheryl. Will she? I very much doubt it.