“Screaming black eyed child ghost terror” screams the front page of today’s Daily Star with a story of a ghostly apparition on Cannock Chase – the Staffordshire beauty spot that is, literally, on my doorstep.
I don’t give such stories much credence. It’s up there with the Cannock Chase Pig Man; the Cannock Chase Puma; and the frequent reports of UFO activity above the Chase.
I say frequent, but they are rather less frequent now following the closure of the Chase Post newspaper by Trinity Mirror – a company that has done much to eradicate local newspapers from Britain. Under its editor Mike Lockley, the Chase Post regularly ran such stories. They still get an occasional – if less frequent – outing at his new paper, the Birmingham Mail.
And it was Mike Lockley in the Birmingham Mail that first published the story about the “reappearance” of the black eyed girl two days ago. And since it was published two days ago it has been picked up by newspapers around the world, including the international on-line paper the Huffington Post and papers as far away as Australia.
And yet, two days later, the Daily Star feels comfortable putting the word “exclusive” on its rehash of this two-day-old internationally reported story.
Perhaps the word “exclusive” means something different when it is used by the Daily Star and other Fleet Street titles of a similar ilk. Perhaps not.
But of this I’m certain: there is nothing of note in these “news” reports of a black eyed girl ghost; and there’s nothing “exclusive” about the Daily Star’s re-hash.