Kielty apologises for McCann jokes

I think I've said before that the McCann case isn't a barometer of the redeemability of the world. It's not an article of faith, nor an indicator of someone's moral health. We're a battle here about what it means to be human, I think. Kielty's job is to be funny. Primarily, being funny is involved with looking, noting and amplifying things around you. At it's best funny can make an audience think. If a comedian refers to events outside of himself, he will be taking a position that some may be offended by. He is taking the position that he has the right to make comment of the activities and behaviour of other individuals. The stormer outers will be following the line that it is inhuman to mock the expressed feelings of another human, and that individuals are paramount. They will feel a direct connection between the McCann's and themselves. One side thinks the other is unfeeling, the other thinks its opposite to be unthinking. I think it sounds like everything is rosy and healthy there. Cheers, Mark

Whatever the rights and wrongs of whether he should have made the joke, he definitely has a point. I think it's important here to distinctly seperate the feelings and experiences of the family and how the media is handling the whole affair. Personally I think the whole "Trial by Media" way it is being handled is totally wrong, in that it trivialises the core of what's happening/has happened, it creates a soap opera out of the McCanns' life and it would possibly indeed lead to a situation where I wouldn't be totally surprised if one or more newspapers did offer readers the chance to vote on their innocence... if this hasn't happened somewhere already. There is, however, perhaps a fine line between a comedian being part of the trivialisation and highlighting it by caricature-ing it. pe ps oid What is "the art of tea"? And what does an "odd courgette" look like?

'not what people expect from the bloke who presents Fame Academy and Love Island' Exemplars of good taste both. Ewan