JohnMaddocksAxe said:
There's really quite little to debate on whether complaining to Ofcom about a man's view on football is embarrassing or not.
Ahhh, your particular gift for repackaging a situation. Remove that packaging and there is clearly a lot of room to debate about how much fairness and accuracy we might expect from the media, and when it is reasonable to complain.
Your 'embarrasment' is your own. Do you find partisan views as whole, to be embarrasing, I wonder?
The body isn't designed for football fans (possible, as a whole, one of the most petty, narrow minded, one eyed groups of people in the country) to air their annoyance at the opinion of one man on football. If there was a body designed for that then it would need round the clock manning by thousands as fans of every club (many of them one eyed and biased) will always be able to cite opinions that they see as proof of a vendetta against or a hatred of their club. Even down to minor clubs.
What does football have to do with it? Ofcom don't care wether it's football or carrots. The subject matter is entirely irrelevant.
You either view it as a vehicle for football fans to complain about a view they don't like, in which case you probably support a complaint.
Or you don't, in which case it can only be embarrassing and a complete misuse of what the body was intended for.
If you want to debate Collymore's stance, then that is a different matter. I personally think that he often ties himself in knots and his comments regarding De Jong are misplaced.
But that is a different issue entirely.
How fair and reasonable does he have a responsibility to be, under the laws of the land, and the terms of the broadcasting license? Where is the line drawn... what amounts to unacknowledged/uncorrected factual inaccuracy? Defamation?
Collymore is doing more than expressing a 'view' on 'football'.
He is talking about an actual event, an actual person.
This means he is subject to rules regarding factual inaccuracies and so on. If I'm a presenter, I could present a view that Blair was a warmonger, that is a view. All that has to happen is for that view to balanced editorially (that's why they want you to phone in to disagree). However, if I said that Blair personally shot an Iraqi child, that's an inaccurate statement, and the error would have to be acknowledged, and a correction made.
Defamation is much more complicated to define.
Did Collymore cross the line, did he make factual inaccuracies? Did he make a defamatory remark?
One easy way to find out, is to complain to Ofcom and see what they say.
That is one of the reasons for their existence and is something they encourage.
They don't expect you to cite a regulation. They expect you to contact them when something broadcast upsets you, or strikes you as unfair!
Personally, I never listen to the bugger, much easier.
The whole issue leaves me non-plussed, but I wouldn't deign to tell people what they should and should not do, or imply that they are stupid, immoral, 'little people', whose concerns and feelings do not matter, and are in fact 'All that is wrong with society'
.... at least not without thinking about it a bit better :o)