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Wednesday, October 24, 2007

By Alan W Collins on Wednesday 24th October 2007 18:14 / 4 comments

Yourmedway

Double standards over bloggers

I am writing to respond to the blatant double standards displayed in the letter from ‘A life-long supporter of the Labour Party’ in last week’s Yourmedway.

How hypocritical does he (or indeed she) want to be, asking the paper to unmask the identity of the mystery Tory blogger, whilst refusing to be named him (or her) self?

Yourmedway is unique in allowing any member of the community the right to air their views at such length anonymously, and I am fully supportive of their blogger feature, and see the only reason for Labour activists to believe otherwise being that they want to put a name to the person they are about to attack.

On the other hand, however, I was encouraged to see that Councillor Bill Esterson has been able to rise above party politics in order to save the Brompton post office.

Post offices are vital services, particularly in Brompton and it is important those campaigning to save them are not divided because of their political differences.

Alan Collins
Twydall
Via email

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4 Comments

Cllr John Ward says:

Saturday 27th October 2007 at 06:17

Good one! I hope it gets printed.

This is not the first time (by a very long way!) that I have encountered double standards from Labour members and supporters, nor is it the first time I have read anonymous sniping from them.

The notorious (well, notoriously bad!) “Medway Tory Watch” blog — not updated since last April, by the way — has always been anonymous, although I have a fair idea who might be behind it. The style of writing tends to give it away…

By the way, I think you are being very generous to Cllr Esterson, who is putting himself about a lot simply because he is one of the wannabe replacements for Bob Marshall-Andrews as Rochester & Strood constituency Labour Parliamentary Candidate.

His activities — and those of the other known contenders — have been so transparent over the past several months, as has been the factioning of the Labour group on the council between the supporters of different contenders.

It’s all great fun for those of us who are watching the various antics…
Alan Collins says:

Saturday 27th October 2007 at 11:34

Only letters which have been printed appear on this section. I can think of a few other letters which have not been printed and so have not been reproduced here. The title is the date of the publication in which they have been printed.

Incidentally, you can read Yourmedway online (the issue in which the above letter was published can be found here).

I had realised why Councillor Esterson was being so “neutral”, but the thought, there is no way he is going to get the candidacy, so I may as well “praise” him for his “neutrality”. Well, that is unless he has a sex change before December 14…
Cllr John Ward says:

Saturday 27th October 2007 at 16:56

Many thanks for the info, Alan.

You wrote: “Only letters which have been printed appear on this section.” Useful to know.

I went through a long period when they didn’t publish anything of mine, and then a couple of shortened (i.e. edited-down) versions of what I wrote, so I adopted a different approach.

I put everything I had written up on my website, at http://www.john-ward.org.uk/horsted/html/letters.html including if — and how much of — it had been printed, and when. Interestingly, once I let the newspapers know of this, and the viewing statistics of my website, they started printing far more of what I wrote…

Thanks for the link to the YourMedway issue that included your letter: I have taken a PDF copy of that page, as well as a copy of the page with the Esterson interview. Why that second download? Well, I sometimes need a good laugh
Alan Collins says:

Saturday 27th October 2007 at 17:01

I may start doing that at some point, but only when my letters are not being printed.

I must admit I haven’t read that interview yet, although I too could do with a laugh…