Rugby league legend Dale Shearer is not in a good way this morning. He's in a critical condition, after crashing his car into a pole while reportedly fleeing from police, driving home from a party. There's speculation he may have been drinking before the accident, but that hasn't been confirmed. Not altogether an unusual incident or accident in Australia, but obviously newsworthy because Shearer is so famous.
But what the fuck is up with this?
That's from the front page of News.com.au, the portal news site for all of Rupert Murdoch's Australian online newspapers.
"Now it appears Dale Shearer....is the victim of a ghastly curse."
Does it? Maybe if you're sniffing Ajax.
Did some old witch point a bone at Shearer and declare, "You will drive dangerously fast and out of control when you see the police"?
The article the News.com.au front page links to says nothing about a 'curse', and is a straightforward piece of reporting about the tragic outcome of what appears to be Shearer fleeing from police and losing control of his car.
The Daily Telegraph headline and story the News.com.au 'Deadly Curse' headline box links to doesn't say anything at all about a Ghastly Curse. The word 'curse' isn't even used. Though it does mention Shearer lost his wife recently to cancer.
So curses are causing cancer and car accidents, according to News.com.au.
How monumentally fucking stupid and trashy can a mainstream news site get?
Not even the most ethically barren blogger would try and pull off something like that.
UPDATE : Err, now it appears, the Australian novelist recently jailed in Thailand for daring to print a harsh word or two about that country's royal family is somehow involved in Shearer's crash. And this headline box now appears on The Daily Telegraph site as well :
And I thought I made some embarrassing mistakes on this blog.
