Dialogue: Where everyone's playing the shame game

Two months ago 8-year-old Sarah Payne's naked body was found in a field near her home in Surrey. She had been raped and murdered.

The resulting public outcry was, as you can imagine, vociferous although her family maintained an incredible dignity amid it all, calling for people to celebrate Sarah's short life instead of baying for blood.

his was a plea the News of the World did not heed. Making the most of the moment, it struck while the iron of outrage was hot and began a campaign it called "Naming and Shaming." And the goal of that mission? To "out" known paedophiles in the community, printing their names and photographs and that's when the mania took hold.

As a direct result, the women of Paulsgrove Estate, Portsmouth, led the news for a week, subjecting suspected sex offenders to hoarsely hurled abuse and threateningly waved placards. The righteous love it when other people do terrible things; they'll mount their high horses and rampage through the streets - never miss an opportunity to be holier than him next door.

The mob threw stones, overturned cars and subjected their children to the spectacle of adults screaming obscenities and generally behaving badly.

Although I don't think those women are entirely to blame for their actions, they were probably at their wits' ends trying to think of what to do with the kids over the holidays when the News of the World gave them carte blanche to form a vigilante group. The result? Five innocent families were driven off the estate and many others were afraid to leave their homes for fear they should be caught up in it all.

And what if a person has actually done their time? They'll almost certainly have suffered in prison. I believe paedophiles aren't given much in the way of protection in jail and, regardless of all that eye-for-an-eye business, other prisoners shouldn't be deciding who deserves to be punished, or how - any more than the press or the mothers of Portsmouth.

But I blame the paper that started it. I've long been opposed to the media "making" the news. I've always thought, in my naiveteaacé, that they should simply report it. On the occasions I've actually seen the news happen, in the flesh, it has always shocked me how the images and facts are manipulated.

In Madrid recently, when a bomb was detonated by ETA Basque separatists near where I was staying, I strayed into the ensuing protest. There, a cameraman, high up on a balcony, herded, with gestures, a group of protesters into his frame, whooping them up with his arms. Is that reporting the news?

How about the billionaire businessman, the guy with the penchant for hash? I agree that wealth and power shouldn't exclude a person from punishment - the law is the law - but I'd hoped that that incident might lead to debate on the crime, not the criminal. And when his name was released it was like, "Who? So what?" All that energy and effort expended for what?

Or television news that now puts music beneath the stories, adding a sense of urgency and atmosphere? Kate Addie, chief news correspondent for the BBC since 1989, said at a session of the Edinburgh book festival that the growing public relations explosion meant that media are more managed, more contrived.

One commentator suggested that the editors in this hemisphere feared that the summer would bring with it an "event vacuum" and the paedophile-naming muck was raked to generate a bit of news. They needn't have worried, though. There have been sufficient bombings, murders and plane crashes to fill section after section deep into winter as well.

I first heard about the naming and shaming when the editor, on television, was justifying his decision to continue with his scheme and all I could see in his eyes was the promise of increased circulation. Had he known just how much mess his actions would cause, would he have gone ahead with publishing those details?

Sadly, I think he would have, because sales are at the forefront of most issues these days, rarely public good.

But try telling that to the editor of the News of the World , who insisted he was doing his bit for the people of England, the children of England, Mother England.

Crap. Violence, fear and a vigilante society are what the naming and shaming brought about and, although the campaign has since been cancelled, the damage has been done.