Video Capers - Journalists Can Be Heroes - Just for One Day

Last updated : 10 January 2006 By The Govanhill Gub
Have you ever wanted to be anyone in a film or a book or a play? Has there ever been that one role you would like to identify with? Of course in my eclectic, Mexican Jumping Bean of a brain there are far too many to mention but here are a couple anyway for your perusal;



1 - Paul Newman in Hombre when he goes down from the mineshaft to die with a satchel full of dirty clothes. And the rest of his weary band of travellers finally realise that he never wanted that stolen money for himself, he wanted it for the Apaches he grew up with.

2 – Henry Fonda in Twelve Angry Men. What’s more can be said about this performance? And his daughter wasn’t half bad in Barbarella either!



In literature, and thanks manly to the efforts of PG Wodehouse and Tom Sharpe, my heroes tend to range between reprobate second sons hell bent on smuggling impostors into castles under the noses of austere older sisters. And misunderstood English Lit teachers who stick blow up dolls down holes in building sites.

But getting bang up to date, on Friday just past I have to admit I’ve added a new hero to my collection. Yup step forward and take a bow Ewen Cameron. If we could only take the ‘Hearts supporting’ bit out of the equation, then how good must it have felt to be him last Friday after THAT press conference at the Parkhead?

I mean there he was, just a lowly East of Scotland hack with a wee East of Scotland radio outfit sitting amongst his peers and so called superiors in Scottish footballing journalism. The no nonsense ‘Weegie’ big hitters as it were. And then it finally dawned on him, the big hitters, the city slickers were too TERRIFIED to mention the BIG news story of the year thus far. I refer of course to Celtic's’ second pro-IRA outrage this season. And the rest as they say folks is history.

You better believe it people Real Radio is due massive respect for having the professional and journalistic integrity to actually bring this latest Sellik, sectarian scandal to the widespread public’s attention, especially when they took the fight to Mhankdom in their ain midden. Think about it, when did you think you’d ever see the words; ‘journalistic’ and ‘integrity’ in conjunction with Scottish football ever again?

It gets better though. Because if you think it is good to be Ewen Cameron just now, then how embarrassing must it be to be Bill Leckie for instance? Not that we should ever feel sorry for ‘jagged little Bill’ you understand.

In the Leckster we have a journalist, who has had a free ride on the anti-sectarian ticket for the last dozen years or so. No one hates sectarianism and bigotry like oor Wullie it would seem. Well, that’s if you’re Bob Malcolm being set up in an autograph scam that is, or Donald Findlay. But if it’s the news that Celtic PAID, actually PAID an IRA terrorist to paint that pathetic Jock Stein banner then it has been conclusively proved, the ‘Leckie’ is always going to run out at the vital moment. It is time to change the meter methinks.

But there are more important issues here than singling out individual journalists on this issue. The most gratifying aspect of the last few days for yours truly has been the awakening (rude in some quarters hopefully) of untold numbers of Rangers fans who inhabit this website. Welcome aboard lads’ n lassies. But I do have to ask; what took you so long?

In many ways I was an outsider also watching this story unfold as I started back work on Wednesday and therefore only caught up with this major (IMHO) story, day by day when I finally got back from t’ mill in the evening. And what caught my eye immediately is the fact that people were not prepared to let this story go.

For what it’s worth, I firmly happen to believe that the earlier sectarian scandal involving Celtic this season (Bannergate) was a far bigger and far more important story, especially in today’s all singing and dancing anti-sectarian Scotland. Think about it again people and reverse the roles. Celtic PAID an IRA terrorist to paint the Jock Stein memorial banner and not one single media outlet in this country was prepared to run with the story. Do you think Rangers paying Milltown Michael to paint the Jock Wallace banner would have been met with the same stony silence? Nah, neither do I!

But perhaps Bannergate was too ‘underground’ for most people to get close to. The crucial difference I see with this Hartson/Pearo duet, is that many, many hundreds, if not thousands, of Rangers orientated people have witnessed this evidence with their own eyes. This is not mass hysteria by any means.

Having witnessed what happened (and it is 100% clear on my PC) then Rangers fans should be asking the following question. If you and I can see quite clearly what a Celtic player is doing then why the hell is 99% of the Scottish footballing press REFUSING to see this also?

When they ask that question then they should start seeing the bigger picture hopefully (and finally) for themselves.

We sniggered earlier at the plight of that avowed hater of sectarianism, Bill Leckie. But what of the unenviable situation Radio Snyde now finds itself (delightfully) in? You do have to ask just how much further south of utter contempt can one entire radio station actually travel?

I mean, here we have a radio station that is supposedly dedicated to the West of Scotland, and this devotion has been carefully nurtured over the last thirty-two years. This is a station that prides itself on being THE voice of the West of Scotland. A radio station that is vehement in its abhorrence of sectarian bigotry. As Davie Provan’s heartfelt blast at Paul Gascoigne’s invisible flute eight years ago would assuredly testify. (No sniggering at the back there)

Yet a wee Aberdeen based rag, that is probably more interested in the price of North Sea Cod than football can expose yet another Celtic sectarian ‘scandal’ before their big city rivals in Weegietown? You just couldn’t make it up. You have to ask yourselves WHY Radio Snyde, those dedicated haters of sectarianism have clammed up about this recent Sellik shame video? I asked how far Snyde could plummet morally. If they keep digging, they’ll break in at the South Pole sometime soon.

There are however bigger fish to be found than what is caught up at Aberdeen or in Radio Clyde’s mindset. Think BBC and think Follow Follow website. You add the two together and come up automatically with a spurious cartoon about the hanging of Neil Lennon. After all, it was only two months ago. The BBC hates all forms of sectarianism it would appear.

Once again Rangers fans must ask why an insignificant cartoon on a football website was of huge significance down Queen Margaret Drive. Yet two Celts ahem, ‘Athenryeing’, which is considered front page news everywhere else in the West of Scotland fails to make the news anywhere on the BBC TV? Remember that this is the sectarian hating BBC we’re talking about.

The tawdry part played in this game of charades by those charlatans at Nil By Mouth must also be questioned. The fact is, there were thousands upon thousands of people in Scotland had seen this video clip by Thursday. There is no doubt in my mind that the NBM fraud squad would have seen it also. So the question remains; why weren’t NBM pro-active in this case as opposed to waiting till the storm had broke before given us there halfpenny worth?

Credit where credit is due however. Whatever else you can say about the fetid organisation that is Celtic FC, they have a propaganda machine that would have made Goebbels swoon.

‘The tape is a fake’ claimed a Yahoo lackey. You know and I know and even the dogs in the street (aka the Scottish press) know that if the tape were a fake, they would have wheeled Dr Nick Riviera onto centre stage to give us the reasons why. They didn’t because the tape is not a fake. But hey, Timmy claims it is, so shut the feck up, the case is now closed. This mhob would deny the Holocaust if the situation demanded it.

Yes Timothy has a smashing propaganda dept, but it only works as it does here in Scotland because of a 70% sympathetic press and the other 30% too terrified to take them on. “Thugs And Thieves” anyone?

But let’s forget about the press for the moment. Their shame has been a silver lining for this website as far as I’m concerned. As I said earlier the events of last week have been a real eye opener and head turner for a significant amount of ‘pacifist’ Rangers fans online.

That being the case there is only one serious question left to ask. It has now been proved beyond all reasonable doubt that the Scottish footballing press is (and has been for a long time) working to an anti-Rangers FC agenda when it comes to the thorny issue of sectarianism/religious bigotry in Scottish football. It is not up for debate any longer.

You know it and I know it. So what are the Rangers Board of Directors going to do about it?

THE GOVANHILL GUB