The harsh face of reality

If you know that Max Clifford is the voice of reason, you can probably guess the sentence has to end "... in a conversation with Sharon Osbourne, at least."

The pair were on a panel at the Guardian's Edinburgh Television Festival debating reality TV, which was most notable for the way the pair were desperate to simultaneously destroy each other's arguments, while not offending their friends and paymasters:

"You know there's a line where people say you can't polish a turd," Osbourne said. "This is the man that polishes turds."

In a heated exchange, Osbourne added that she wasn't referring to Simon Cowell, who Clifford represents and who she famously clashed with on The X Factor, but instead meant his reality TV stars.

When Clifford said he advised his clients not to go on reality shows, Osbourne replied: "If you earn some portion of your living from these people going on these shows bearing their souls, don't knock them."

Osbourne also tried to correct the impression that she quit the X Factor over money (an impression created when Cowell said at the launch of the new series that she quit over demands for more money):

"The X Factor was the best experience of my life, I adored the show as it had done so much for me, but I quit because it was just time for me to go," she said.

"I was talking to a network in America about doing a show with my family and I couldn't do both," she added.

Although Simon Cowell manages to do X Factor, Britain's Got Talent, America's Got Talent and American Idol all at the same time. Even Piers Morgan manages to slime across shows on both sides of the Atlantic - Britain's and America's as well as the misleadingly titled Celebrity Apprentice.

Mark Frith was also on the panel, and to thank him for coming the Guardian finds space for one of his comments:

Former Heat magazine editor Mark Frith, also a panelist, said he had decided to leave the title as the world of celebrity had become "too dark" for him.

"I couldn't look at any more Amy Winehouse pictures with cuts on her arms and put them into an entertaining form," he added.

Frith spun this "oh celebrity has become so dark" line in his diaries, too - but why was he comfortable with running stories laughing at Leslie Ash and pointing fingers of fun at celebrities his magazine suggested might be suffering eating disorders, and all of a sudden decided it was too much? Isn't it surprising that you can run week after week of paparazzi coverage of Britney's breakdown - which, at the very least, wasn't exactly helped by the 24 hour coverage - and then to start tutting about how terrible it all is after you've left the job to pursue other projects? If you shit on the carpet, don't complain about the smell.

The secret diary of Mark Frith

Another dip into the sound of selves being justified as we open up Mark Frith's Heat editing diary:

The front page of today's Mirror shows Kate Moss appearing to snort cocaine at a recording session with her boyfriend Pete Doherty.

Yes, it's a good story, but surprising? I don't think so. Heat won't be running anything on it. Our readers are not interested in this horrible couple.

The Heat audience are surprisingly specific, aren't they?

Mikey and Gracey from Big Brother? Pull up a chair. Peter Andre and Jordan? We're all agog. Paris Hilton? What have you got? Kate Moss and Pete Doherty? God, do you think we're interested in them? What must you think of us?

It's not like they're interested in gossip about famous people or anything.

The secret diary of Mark Frith

Time, once again, to open the diary of Mark Frith. This time, we find Mark publishing stickers mocking a severely disabled child, despite - as he cheerfully admits - his colleagues having told him they didn't think it was a good idea.

Mark attempts to set up his justification early. In an entry which predates his sticker calamity, he mentions that Jordan did an interview about her kid:

While most celebrities are protective of their children, it's in Jordan's interest to be public about them.

You see? It's her, she put them in the public domain. Her! Her! HER!

Frith explains what he means by "in her interest" - "she makes a fortune out of posing with them" - but does he mean that otherwise nobody would write about her? That's clearly not true, as his magazine never finds reasons to ignore a Jordan story if it can.

He then points out that Jordan can sometimes see that aspects of Harvey's behaviour can be amusing:

She makes a fortune from posing with them and in our interview she speaks a lot about him - particularly his food intake and weight.

It can't be easy for her but she's very funny about it. 'Sometimes I ask: "Do you love Mummy?" He says: "No." Then I say: "Do you love cake?" He instantly says: "Yes." '

So, there's his justification set up. Forward, now, to November:

The stickers are due at the printers when one of my team interjects.

'Some of us have a real problem with the Harvey one. People will take offence and we shouldn't do it.'

'No one will take offence. Everyone knows Jordan is always joking about the amount he eats. Leave it in. It'll be fine.'

So, Mark doesn't actually see there's a difference between a mother saying of her own child "he says the funniest things sometimes; he said he loves cake" and a commercial magazine giving its readers stickers that say "Harvey wants to eat me." Frith even attempts to say the sticker is "a reference to the interviews she gives the Press about her son's ravenous food intake" rather than a reference to the child being quite large for his age.

Forward another couple of weeks, and Frith is starting to have slight - only slight - doubts:

The new issue is back from the printers. There's still disquiet about the Harvey sticker and, seeing it in the middle of the magazine, I'm starting to worry. It feels all wrong.

But isn't the editor's job to twig this sort of "all wrongness" in the first place?

You'll note he doesn't say it is wrong - just that it feels all wrong. He also doesn't say sorry:

There has been a lot of criticism about the Harvey sticker - from the media and readers.

I seek advice and am told I must write a letter to Jordan, and have a statement prepared for any media outlet that wants a comment.

He "seeks advice"; he's told to "write a letter". No word of contrition yet.

Today's Times has a piece on Jordangate under the headline: The Lowest Point In British Journalism.

In 1989, The Times' sister newspaper, The Sun, ran an article about the Hillsborough football disaster and alleged that Liverpool fans had picked the pockets of victims and urinated on police officers as they tended to the dying and injured.

The Sun had to admit that none of the allegations were true. They apologised, yet even now there are large sections of Liverpool where newsagents still refuse to stock it.

But, according to The Times, our sticker was worse than that.

A big mistake? Undoubtedly. A misjudgment on my part? Guilty as charged. The lowest point in British journalism? I don't think so. Still, the pressure on me is mounting.

So, it's a "misjudgement" - at least he goes that far - and then lumbers into another misjudgement by trying to justify his actions by comparing them to something one of his critic's sister papers did twenty years ago.

And, yes, the Sun's Hillsborough coverage was shocking. But, on the other hand, you published - as a giveaway - a sticker for readers to decorate their belongings with which featured a jibe at a disabled child.

You're right, of course, Frith, the Times was wrong to say it was the lowest point in British journalism. But only because this isn't journalism, it's just turning people into freakshows.

Yesterday, we heard how Frith justified his cruelty towards Leslie Ash when she was at a low point in her life by suggesting it's what his readers would be doing anyway. You'd have thought if he really believed in that as an excuse, he'd be deploying it here, too, wouldn't you? It's almost as if he knows in his heart that there are just some things you might hear on the streets that shouldn't be given the dignity of print - even the spurious dignity of Heat - but can't quite bring himself to admit it.

The secret diary of Mark Frith

Hard though it may be to believe, the Mail is running a third day of Mark Frith's diaries.

Mark is opening his Christmas cards:

No matter how well things are going, there are Ricky Gervais's Christmas cards to put you in your place.

Last year it was: 'Dear people in charge of fame. Merry Xmas. PS: I have a picture of a celebrity with a pimple. If you magnify it, you could fill a couple of pages. Do I get any money?'

This year he's gone for: 'To all Heat readers, May you find happiness and something better to do with your time in the New Year. Love, Ricky Gervais.'

This is, actually, one of the most fascinating things I've read - Ricky Gervais, desperately trying to distance himself from the whole celebrity merry-go-round, but not so far he's not going to not send Heat a Christmas card; the editor of Heat, knowing that the card is an uncomfortable attempt to simultaneously embrace and yet keep dignity , suggesting that the messages undercut him, but still using them to bolster how important he is.

The secret diary of Mark Frith

Pull on your rubber gloves, and let's rummage once again in the diary of former Heat editor Mark Frith.

Mark decides to make a stand for press freedom:

Today we've run our Leslie Ash piece with a sidebar entitled: What Does She Look Like? - featuring pictures of a Canary Rockfish, Jar Jar Binks from Star Wars, Jack Nicholson as The Joker and Janice from The Muppets.

I read the piece through three times before it went off - are we being just a little too cruel? In the end I decided that we had to go with it because it is completely in sync with what our readers will be thinking.

In offices, colleges and front rooms right now, people are discussing this picture - and they're not being kind.

Aha! That's alright then. It's okay to be snide about the picture, because people will be looking at the picture and being snide about it. What's the Eminem defence? "'cause I'm only givin' you things you joke about with your friends inside your living room"?

Of course, Frith doesn't stop to think why people are talking about the picture in the first place - because the media published it for people to be snide about in the first place.

And even if people are being snide, does Frith have to join in?

Apart from exposing the howling lack of human feeling that sits in the place where his mother must have hoped a soul would have formed, what the hell is the point of a magazine which merely lists the cruel jokes its readers would have already made?

The secret diary of Mark Frith

Let us dip again into Mark Frith's diary, an insight into what life is really like deciding how much you should pay for a photo of someone from Big Brother in a bikini. Mark gets a call to step in front of the cameras:

Today, I filmed the 'celebrity' edition of The Weakest Link. Which is odd, given that I'm not remotely famous.

When I signed up to do this, the people on it alongside me were pretty impressive: Jarvis Cocker, Mo Mowlam and members of the So Solid Crew. By the time I arrived the line-up had become me, Edwina Currie, one of Bucks Fizz, the bloke who runs marathons in silly outfits for charity and Terry Christian, the TV presenter.

This is curious - given that Frith is editing the nation's celebrity magazine, surely he'd know that when researchers are trying to lure people on the telly, they tell them who else is doing it - but always, always, reading from the dream list drawn up during the official brain storm ("Archbishop Tutu! Gordon Ramsay! Kelvin McKenzie!") rather than the shorter list of those who've said yes (That bloke off the thing about hairdressing... the TV editor of the Daily Post... Bobby Ball, if Tommy still refuses to do Celebrity Donkey Punch...). Surely, though, even he must have realised that if they're reduced to ringing the bloke who edits Heat, they've pretty much run out of celebrity options and are starting to think about reworking it as an ITV Regional Weather forecasters Special instead?

Mark does go on - and beats Edwina Currie in the final round. He lists how much he won for his charity but, oddly, doesn't mention the name of the charity - which, you would have thought, would have made sense to have dropped in if it was a cause close to his heart.

Mark is so self-effacing about his lowly status throughout. And yet he dismisses the great Bernie Clifton as "the bloke who runs marathons in silly outfits for charity".

The secret diary of Mark Frith

The Daily Mail is running extracts from Mark Frith's diaries this week. Frith was the editor of Heat - which we think means he tossed the coin every issue to decide if it was going to be a "Look - they're fat" issue, or a "Scary thin celebs" edition.

Of course, "got up, went in, drew a circle around a sweat patch on Lindsay Lohan's shirt, suggested 'ewwww' caption" isn't going to keep the Mail readers interested, so instead we get Mark's response to September 11th. People hurling themselves to certain death? The largest attack on US soil? The prospect of a generation of fear and war? Why, it makes you think:

Our critics are saying that everything's changed - that there's a new seriousness in the air and that celebrity culture is dead. Perhaps they're right.

But then I watch as female customers come and go. Without exception, they walk past the papers and pick up Heat or OK or Now.

Not much about these women seems to have changed. Although I'm sure they're shocked by what has happened, their concerns are clearly still the same: Will they get to work on time? Will their money last until their next pay packet?

And now more than ever they need entertainment, a diversion from the horrors of the latest news bulletin. They want something frivolous, something to lose themselves in, something glamorous.

What do they want, Mark?

They want celebrities.

The celebrities will save us! They'll make everything all right! If only Bush had thought of that, eh - instead of eventually coming out of hiding to announce war on Osama Bin Laden, he should have just got Paris Hilton to snog Britney Spears. America would have been back on an even keel by teatime.

Note, too, that Frith insists every single woman was buying a celeb magazine - he doesn't recall what men were buying; probably something about locomotives or woodworking. Maybe they were buying the newspapers. But the little ladies, love them, they needed some shots of Rod Stewart, to save their pretty little heads from all the big thoughts in the news.