Released on = January 21, 2007, 1:52 pm

Press Release Author = Straight Talk In

Industry = Entertainment

Press Release Summary = Unwitting participants in a game of fiction versus reality.
Is this how Big Brother programme chiefs have engaged us?


Press Release Body = Liverpool\'s greeting card publishers Straight Talk In Ltd, the
intended major contributor to Channel 4\'s next Big Brother series, has withdrawn its
proposed sponsorship deal, worth an estimated six figure sum, and wants nothing more
to do with the channel. This is due, in part, to the boundaries between the public
domain and the world of t.v. having become so fused, and it believing that Channel 4
is of the opinion that the t.v. media is bigger than Business, having no regard for
anything but itself, says the publishers Managing Director John Mcnulty. Whilst the
recent antics and behaviour of the housemates have not gone so far to curry favour
with the publishers, nor have taken lesser priority in its estimation, there are
other issues it feels less comforted by and compelled to protect itself against.
\'Forget social ettiquette and the private space we have enjoyed, day to day, in a
life and world, wherein we have kept vigil over a respectful distance from each
other, preventing us from savaging each other, in packs, like wild animals\', Mr
McNulty enthuses, \'the public domain has now been intruded upon, and if you think
just in a \'goody\' way, not so\' He fears for the future of his business, and remarks
that \'Irresponsible and radical programmers such as Channel 4, which he thinks makes
no excuses for themselves, nor for their intention to undo the social fabric of
society, or the well being of its upstanding citizens, have exacted powers beyond
the fanaticism that it has for its Big Brother creation, even beyond the delusions
of grandeur\', he compares with \'what Hitler suffered, believing he could control the
on and off button over anti-semitism\'. Now, he says, \'it feels it can precide over
the public domain, dictating what say the public can have over its own life, and
how, and what place it can hold, and when. Channel 4 treat us all in the public
domain like we are in its show\', he holds. This is obviously disconcerting, in what
is suggested to be their opinion toward their sponsors. \'It is roping the reputation
of businesses in to the chaos, besmirching and sullying their character, showing a
total lack of respect for who put them there in the first place,\' says the firm. It
follows that, at the onset of the racial and abusive outbursts of one of its Big
Brother contenders Jade Goody, \'Channel 4 did not once take the responsible
initiative to intervene and remove what the company describes as the evil and
abhorrant character from its house of depravity, in spite of the fact that what the
live show was airing upset every legal, moral and decent norm that holds civility to
account\'. The company asserts that later news syndications revealed Goody\'s
admission of racism (announced on ITV Teletext Saturday 20th January 2007), which
Channel 4\'s Big Brother had earlier chosen to put aside, disguising it as being
\'just a girly thing\'. Yet reports were made where ratings continued to soar, the
financial cogs continuing to turn for Channel 4. If it had been this series of Big
Brother that it had sponsored it would have felt used and abused, the company says.
Straight Talk In Ltd understands and accepts the responsibility and implications of
Business, its wider social, environmental and educational role. The fact that
Channel 4 chiefs failed to act appropriately on anything that was happening, at
least not until the public were forced to take the uncompromising and unprecedented
steps to intervene, with complaints to Ofcom and to the police, protesting against
what was continually being unleashed upon it, did the publishers realize that
Channel 4 had lost the plot. \'Channel 4 acknowledged the severity and impact that
Goody\'s torrent of abuse was having on the wider world\', Mr McNulty observed,
believing that it was \'lording itself over the situation\', in the way it was
managing the increasing rise of public sentiment and media frenzy that was being
created, with a statement, he quotes, allegedly from its chief Andy Duncan,
declaring \'all publicity is good publicity\' (Daily Mirror TV Editor Nocola Methven
20th Jan 2007). \'Yet the financial cogs continued to turn for Channel 4\', he
continues, \'from racism, bullying and more recently homophobia\'. The company since
observed further acts of bigotry when Danielle Lloyd taunted H (aka Ian Watkins of
Steps), on the Thursday Night live show, with remarks of ridicule; \'you\'re a little
gay boy\', the company alleges she taunted. Dwelling on comments such as, \'television
that can be trusted\', and \'when we get it wrong we own up\', Channel 4 Chief Andy
Duncan\'s own statements, made in his lecture to Christian Faithworks 18 months ago:
\'far from this\', Mr McNulty exclaims, \'what we now have is television that does
anything but [quotes] \'enlightens rather than reinforce prejudice\'.\' The company
could not believe that it had to become an international incident before Channel 4
chiefs would engage with any appropriate action. \'By that time it had already shown
the extent of its contempt.\' Nor could it believe that instead of removing the
inauspicious character from the house, the network took the unprecedented decision
to break its own rules and re-write its own format. \'At this point\', Mr McNulty
retreats, \'the dividing barrier that seperates Big Brother from the wider world, the
defining line that keeps the public at a safe distance from the often turmultuous
and surreal world of t.v., had crossed over in to reality.\' It was this that broke
all and any further relations between Ch4 and itself. A statement made by the
company directors, in a letter issued to Channel 4, outlines the opinion that the
\'Big Brother format had either failed or had stretched itself beyond mere televised
entertainment - i.e. that which we would usually sit up to watch, titilated,
observing in considerate silence, at the ready with our text finger. That it now
engulfed us all as players in an unnerving plot that threw caution to the wind and
set us all up against the jaws and vice of t.v. in the making - of which we had no
choice or agreement about participating in\'. \'Yet\', Mr McNulty quotes \'Channel 4
declares itself to be \'the true voice of democracy\' (Davina McCall - Big Brother
Live Eviction show Friday 19th January 2007). Supposedly, one of its central
purposes, and most important responsibilities, is the underlying principal and value
it holds, that \'tolerance and understanding of others can only be built on knowledge
and respect\'. Channel 4 has proven itself to be in the autonomous position and the
prevailing authority to enforce this, by pushing incidents of the nature we have
witnessed, and from which it feels we can learn, in to our faces, telling us when we
can and when we cannot free ourselves from such disturbing exposure and how, if we
wish to, we have to pay for that privilege - by texting to vote at 50p a time.\'
Taking stock of the fact that it is now apparent, when Big Brother called Goody into
the diary room, reprimanding her and cautioning the prevention of the racial jibes
and verbal attacks on housemate Shilpa Shetty, which it had witnessed, that it
admitted that something was wrong in it all. Yet, Straight Talk In shareholders feel
that it chose to patronize the public, telling it that it had decided no wrong had
been done. It treated the press with equal contempt with the lame excuses they
believe were passed over to it. And the financial cogs continued to turn, unlike the
way the company\'s investors would like to see a return on their investment. In
essence, Mr McNulty feels that Channel 4 ignored Jade Goody and her vicious attacks,
that it turned a blind eye to the suffering of Goody\'s victim, to the unpleasantness
suffered by the rest of the housemates, it ignored its own rules and threw its own
Big Brother format to the wind. \'It ignored the public\'s cry for the immediate
removal of Goody and for an apology from the programme makers and the chaos that
ensued. Instead an announcement was made in the form of a statement from Channel 4
chiefs saying that, \'it is a good thing that the show has raised these issues and
provoked such a debate\'. Well, if this is the kind of experimentation we\'d be faced
with hereon from our relations with Channel 4 we\'d sooner outline our realistic
stance in advance, than have our money swallowed by some self-indulgent media
escapade.\' The directors disagreed too with the solutions Big Brother offerd up, to
the votes being staged, to the ostracization of the crowd on eviction day. And were
dismayed to learn that Big Brother, alone, did not stack up by itself. \'You\'d be mad
to put money in to something that really did not work\', they said. The company\'s
final conclusion that Channel 4 showed complete utter contempt for the civil way of
life, liberty, reality and the rights by which we live, enjoy and demand, without
being held to ransom for it, leaves it in no two minds. It believes that the network
rides slipshod over the laws that, in reality, protect us, the customs that preserve
our integrity and conserve our sense of propriety. And in a sinister and disturbing
travesty, it is intransigent about what it believes was CH4 giving an ultimatum to
its viewers, that they either paid their way out of the discomforting and
disconcerted viewing, which they\'d been surprised by, unprepared for, had been made
to be turned into the voyeur that we were not, by such unsudden and unexpected twist
in events, that CH4 itself was airing and controlling and subjecting them to. It too
believes that Channel 4 has total contempt and disrespect for the boundaries between
reality and entertainment. It takes no responsibility for potentially engendering
racial sentiment in the wider community whatsover. Its chief once alleged, \'I make
no claim for Big Brother as social or moral education. It\'s an entertainment show
and a very important one for us commercially\'. \'What he failed to say then\', says Mr
McNulty, \'was that, were any social or educational efficacy to arise from the show,
good or bad, we would distance ourself from the bad, keep with the good, take all
due credit for it, reap all reward and benefit, and, that if that did not happen
naturally, we would enforce it through instigation.\' The company feels that Jade
Goody, her family and the mixed racial groups were an obvious choice for channel 4.
That it is now obviously up to Joe Public, unwitting or not, whether it decides it
wants to be made to become involved in the plot. But whilst the company reminds
itself that Channel 4 will steer no social outcome in a positive direction nor be
held accountable for it, it refuses to invest in something, which it says \'surmounts
to making money from the weakness of others and societal fragility\'. It believes
that Channel 4 should not profit in any way from this kind of programming in this
type of instance. \'Straight Talk In Ltd would never consider the appropriation of
funds, whatever the kind, if it could not take full responsibility for them and
accountability over them\', say its directors. \'The laws of consideration, in any
business contract, mean that you get out equal to what you put in. The feeling
toward the general public and its vested interests are far more important than over
the profit of the company\'. It is of the opinion that if Channel 4 were able to
provide the key tangible outputs and answers that are intrinsic to any successful
business aim, if it could positively turn about the dark heart of private prejudice
that its show unearthed, why can it not provide explanation for it, be prepared to
do so, provide those answers now, steer society in the direction it feels it should
be led, instead of charging it for the privilege of an agonizing torment firstly?
The answer must be that it cannot. Society itself has not yet found the answer. And
this leaves CH4 in a place where it is just exploiting strife that it is setting up
itself. Hardly a professional institution it is and certanly does it have no place
in real business.\' Lastly, according to company research, Daily Mirror\'s Bob Roberts
in his 20.01.07 report quoted Trevor Philips, Chair of The Commission for Equality
and Human Rights, as saying that, \'The reason so many people are disturbed by what
they have seen is that the programme is holding up a mirror to our society and few
of us like what we see\'. \'What concerns us\', says Mr McNulty, \'is what authority
appointed Channel 4 to hold society up in judgment in this way. We are part of many
professional and institutional body being a ligitimate UK business enterprise, yet
we have never come across any organisation that carries the expository voice of god.
What the programme has done is laid bare its lack of credentials, Mr McNulty
confides. \'And whilst the company holds that nothing can be gotten from this type of
service, except mere titilation, it urges that the public too need only simply to
ask itself \'what\'s in it for me\'?\' ###

Web Site = http://www.credhedz.com

Contact Details = Company: Straight Talk In Limited.
Directors: Mr John McNulty and Mr Richard Williams.
Address: 45 Parton Street, Liverpool. L6 3AN
T: 0151 260 7345 E: business@straighttalkin.ltd.uk
Web Url: www.credhedz.com
Product: CREDHEDZ®
Newsmakers: Mr John McNulty and Mr Richard Williams
OEM: Straight Talk In Ltd