Does John Prescott’s admission that he suffered from bulimia while deputy prime minister deserve sympathy, suspicion or ridicule? Whether it’s his syntax, his affairs or his fondness for Jaguars, the papers have found plenty of reasons to tease Prescott. But his revelation that he suffered from bulimia has prompted some rare sympathy for the former deputy prime minister.
Writing in the Guardian, his fellow bulimia sufferer William Leith says: “Poor John Prescott. I feel for him. More importantly, though, I feel for the society he lives in.”
Uri Geller, another self-confessed bulimic, praises Prescott’s “courage” in admitting his condition.
“No one expects a man, especially a successful one, to have an eating disorder,” he writes in the Telegraph. “It seems such a weakness. But addiction isn’t weak: it’s as powerful as a landslide, and it was burying me alive.”
Such sentiments are echoed online by bulimia experts. “It is good that man in such a high-powered position has finally come out and said he was a sufferer of this insidious disorder,” William Webster writes on the Bulimia Anorexia Blog.
Even the often acerbic Tory blogger Iain Dale feels sorry for Prescott.
“In some ways, his bulimia partly explains his affair with Tracey Temple, and no doubt others,” Dale writes. “We all think of politicians as supremely confident and outgoing people who wouldn’t recognise shyness and self doubt if they hit them in the face. Many politicians are far from confident.”
Trevor Kavanagh, writing in the Sun, says bulimia is “no laughing matter” but thinks that, in Prescott’s case, it was a misdiagnosis, giving him an excuse to poke fun at the “Fat Controller”.
“More likely, he was just a greedy incompetent who gobbled every tasty treat going,” he writes.
The paper’s editorial also taunts Prescott. “By his own admission, he ‘wasn’t a very successful bulimic’,” it says. “No, Mr Prescott. As in so many other areas of life, not very successful at all.”
A post on Blog From the North takes a similar line. “Faced with the realisation of such inadequacies, any man would have turned to the bottle – or in his case, the tin,” it says.
Stephen Glover, in the Mail, is suspicious of Prescott’s “lurid soul-baring”. He describes it as “frivolous, attention-seeking, self-victimising and somewhat hypocritical”, going on to criticise the ex-deputy PM’s “greed”.
Mikea, on the Telegraph’s blog pages, agrees. He asks: “Did he announce it all or ‘come out’ to gain some form of public sympathy?” He says “this ghastly slob” deserves no sympathy.
The Mirror’s editorial takes the “mockers” to task for “poking fun” at Prescott. But it has fun with the story itself by leading with new revelations that he used to “gorge on Big Macs after attending lavish five-course banquets”.
This is an edited and extended extract from the Wrap, guaridan.co.uk’s digest of the day’s papers.
April 21st, 2008 at 11:39 am
The Daily Mail raise suspicions too http://www.media-mentor.co.uk/news/?p=109#more-109 with a few valid points. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the media over the next few days – particularly if it backfires.