The Scum editor wait finally over

by Septicisle
11:10 am - August 27th 2009

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The waiting then is finally over. The moment the nation has been looking forward to has arrived. After months of tension, irritation and terrible puns, not to mention writing, the next editor of the Sun, taking over from Rebekah Wade will be… Dominic Moron (surely Mohan? Ed.).

Who he? Well, he’s probably best known for being a former editor of the Sun’s Bizarre showbiz pages, which is increasingly becoming a signifier for going on to “greatness”, with Piers Morgan and Andy Coulson both formerly helming the columns.

More recently he’s been the deputy editor for the last couple of years, although even the sad individuals like myself who “watch” the Sun will have been hard pressed to see any of his personal influence on the paper.

Indeed, he’s even been editing the paper for the last month while Wade, sorry, I mean Brooks, has been getting to know her new husband even better, and I doubt anyone has noticed any difference whatsoever.

Mohan did for a time have a comment page all to himself, a success so huge that he was swiftly recognised by Private Eye as the World’s Worst Columnist.

None of this will be seen as a surprise. Wade’s appointment as editor was the one which caused the most comment and controversy since Kelvin MacKenzie’s days, both because (durr) she was a woman on what has always been a distinctly laddish paper, and also due to her role as the nation’s paedofinder general while editor of the News of the World.

Murdoch’s choices prior to that had actually been far more conservative, perhaps with the exception of the young and relatively untested Morgan, and also more anonymous. Mohan might have had his photograph taken with every “star” going while editor of Bizarre, but that was quite a while ago by modern standards.

Murdoch’s apparent predilection for showbiz reporters to gradually become editors of his tabloids can be explained easily: they rarely have defined political views, let alone ones which are likely to be counter to his (read Morgan’s anguished and fevered political revision prior to meeting Murdoch in his “diaries”), hence leaving all that tiresome stuff to either him or his trusted lieutenants like Trevor Kavanagh, and secondly, considering that most of the nonsense printed in them now is either about who’s shagging who and who currently has the biggest pair of tits, it makes good business sense that someone who understands that first and foremost has their hand on the tiller.

As it happens, the editor of the Sun has probably never mattered less, with the exception of when the paper was transformed from the Daily Herald into (gradually, with Murdoch’s purchase of the paper in 1969) the super soaraway form which we now know and loathe.

No editor since MacKenzie has ever fully stamped their own personality all over it: sure, Wade has stepped up the campaigning slightly, and her continuing emphasis on saving children from the evil all around them has never wavered, while it has probably become slightly more liberal, in line with society in general, but the politics have remained exactly the same.

Up the arse of Blair, less up the arse of Brown, and now up the arse of Cameron, all dictated by the true management. The lies, laziness and obsessions will all remain the same under Mohan, and Sun-watching will be just as necessary as before.

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About the author
'Septicisle' is a regular contributor to Liberal Conspiracy. He mostly blogs, poorly, over at Septicisle.info on politics and general media mendacity.
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