Results from the Press Complaints Commission

Fair play to the PCC. I honestly didn't expect much when I complained about the shocking article on Paganism and Wicca, but they responded to me by post and by letter and then were good enough to offer me right of reply when the Metro offered this pitiful response:

"Dear XXX,

Many thanks for your letter of December 9 regarding our P1 article ‘Prisoners to get pagan days free’

With regard to the three specific complaints about accuracy:

1, Both Wikipedia and a variety of film databases clearly state the film The Wicker Man concerns paganism and it appears to be a suitable reference in popular culture for readers.

2, According to Wikipedia, Beltaine is ‘the most overtly sexual pagan festival’.

3, We did not say there was a religious connotation to apple bobbing, though it has long been associated with Samhain, Halloween and the Roman Feralia. As the complainant says, some Pagans enjoy it.

The description ‘festival of the lactating sheep’ appears to be very widely used for Imbolc

I do not accept that the article is written in a ‘derogatory fashion, dismissing and insulting’  beliefs. However, I believe it does reflect some surprise about the prison system from those quoted at the end of the article.

Please come back to me if you require further comments,

Yours sincerely,

Graeme K. Fort
Managing Editor

www.metro.co.uk"

The nice lady from the PCC asked if I had any further comments to make.
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You know what? I think I do have something I'd like to say.


"Dear XXX,

Thank you very much for your e-mail and your letter. I would like to respond to Mr Fort's points in turn.

- "1, Both Wikipedia and a variety of film databases clearly state the film The Wicker Man concerns paganism and it appears to be a suitable reference in popular culture for readers."
The film concerns a fictionalised paganism, which bears little resemblence to the modern religion of Neopaganism. It does not at all concern Wicca, as was claimed in the article. If you are not familiar with the film, The Wicker Man features "a religion loosely inspired by Celtic Paganism" (to quote the Wikipedia page where the research appears to have occurred), which believes in regular human sacrifice in order to appease the gods. I can assure you that this is not a part of either Neopaganism or Wicca and, as such, the reference appears far from suitable.

- "2, According to Wikipedia, Beltaine is ‘the most overtly sexual pagan festival’."
I am unable to find that quote on Wikipedia, either in the current articles or in any of the revisions. After a bit of research, I found it on the BBC website, as part of a well-written article on Paganism and Wicca, "Although Beltane is the most overtly sexual festival, Pagans rarely use sex in their rituals although rituals often imply sex and fertility."

I believe that Mr Fort may have taken the phrase out of context somewhat to support his argument. It certainly does not stack up against the article's claims that Beltaine is when believers celebrate the Sun God with ‘unabashed sexuality and promiscuity’

The quotation of 'unabashed sexuality and promiscuity' appears to be taken from this website (http://www.suite101.com/content/wiccan-sabbats-a192774) and is part of a sentence which reads, "In old Celtic traditions it is a time of unabashed sexuality and promiscuity." Again, it appears to have been taken severely out of context.

Incidentally, the Wikipedia article about Beltaine does not mention the word sex. Nor 'promiscuity'.

- "3, We did not say there was a religious connotation to apple bobbing, though it has long been associated with Samhain, Halloween and the Roman Feralia. As the complainant says, some Pagans enjoy it."
The article claims that prisoners "may be able to hold apple bobbing contests for the Halloween festival of Samhain." If there is no implication of this being part of their religious beliefs, then what is this sentence doing in an article about prisoners' rights to religious practice? It would be like claiming that prisoners who are allowed Christmas day off are allowed to play Charades, as it's a party game often associated with the festival. Referencing apple bobbing is a straw man, held up as something ridiculous that I'm certain the prison service have no plans to introduce and I can can see no purpose in mentioning it except to hold it up as a 'wacky belief' of Pagans.

- "The description ‘festival of the lactating sheep’ appears to be very widely used for Imbolc."
Imbolc, as a word, is derived from the old English meaning "ewe's milk" and so I suppose that, in a very literal sense, it is a correct description. However, I have not heard it ever described as such and Wikipedia, which Mr Fort has referenced for his rebuttal evidence twice, has no mention of it. This suggests that the phrasing was chosen deliberately as a ridiculous description which could be presented without context.

- "I do not accept that the article is written in a ‘derogatory fashion, dismissing and insulting’  beliefs. However, I believe it does reflect some surprise about the prison system from those quoted at the end of the article."
The prison system is not my concern and I am surprised that Mr Fort chose to mention it as it bears no relevance to my complaint.

The article cherry picks facts about Wicca and Neopaganism. There is no mention of polytheism, nature reverence or ceremonial prayer/magic, all of which are basic elements of the religion. Instead it mentions a horror movie, "unabashed sexuality and promiscuity" and apple bobbing. To pick an example, that is akin to writing an article about Catholicism, not mentioning Jesus, the Bible or Mass and instead focussing on slavery, the sale of indulgences for sins and Christmas crackers.

If I'm generous, I would say that it demonstrates stunning ignorance and that they have picked out random facts from a google search to decorate their piece, which is hardly stunning journalism. If I am being cynical, I would say that they have selected the most ridiculous 'practices' and 'facts' that they can take out of context, in order to present the religion as a joke.

The cynical point of view is assisted by the cartoon which adorned the front page of the newspaper, which depicted a pagan prisoner with devil horns, complaining about the amount of goat's blood that he had to drink.

Thank you for your time and attention and if you have any questions about Neopaganism or Wicca, then I can refer you to several reputable information resources. I'm aware that they may not be mainstream knowledge, which makes this article even more disappointing. I would regard a printed apology and a short informative paragraph about Neopaganism and Wicca, in the same position as the original article, as suitable resolution to this complaint.

Yours sincerely"

Hopefully he'll get the book thrown at him once for the original article and a second time for trying to defend it with bullshit.

PJW