10:04 AM ET 11/23/97

British women - selfish, sex-obsssed, superficial?

         
        (Release at 7:01 p.m. EST)
            LONDON (Reuters) - Selfish, superficial and obsessed with
sex -- that's the unflattering image of British women that
emerges from some of the country's leading female magazines.
            ``Today's British woman has no children, cares or
responsibilities. Her life is a round of tawdry indulgences. She
rarely thinks, except of sex,'' concluded a survey, published
Monday, of 11 top-selling women's magazines.
            ``She enjoys drunken pranks once associated with adolescent
boys and calls this 'girl power'. Her only moral value is being
non-judgemental; counseling is the solution to every problem.
She is reluctant to make an effort in any cause except the
gym,'' said the survey by the Social Affairs Unit, an
independent research and educational trust.
            The Social Affairs Unit looked in detail at 11 magazines
aimed at 20-40 year old women with a combined circulation of
more than 3.7 million.
            It found the picture that women portrayed of themselves was
unflattering, trivial and amoral. Children are hardly mentioned
in some magazines, personal tragedy is treated as entertainment
and relationships appear to be purely about sex.
            ``Given that when to have children and how to balance
children with work is probably THE issue that worries most
women, it struck me as an odd absence,'' said Ann Applebaum, one
of the 12 researchers.
            The survey found that for so-called ``magazine woman'' sex
has no meaning apart from transient pleasure and no consequence
apart from disease and abortion.
            ``In short she is as crude, offensive and unpleasant as the
most obnoxious of men,'' the survey said.
            Life for magazine woman is principally about self-indulgence
with little need for hard work or effort ``save in that temple
of self-adoration, the gym.''
            The researchers were particularly horrified at the
magazines' treatment of personal tragedy. ``Turning the bizarre
or horrific misfortunes of others into a distasteful freak show
is a fairly common practice,'' the report said.
            The researchers acknowledged that there were differences
between the magazines but said the composite picture of the
British woman of today was one of sex, trivia and
self-indulgence.
            ``They may of course be wrong about her...But their
judgement should not be dismissed too readily.
            ``To be read regularly by so many readers is some kind of
vote of approval. Are the readers also endorsing this portrait
of modern women; have the magazines indeed got modern British
women right?'' the survey asked.
        
 ^REUTERS@

12:25 PM ET 11/17/97

German spies stalked Britain 90 years ago

         
            By Helen Smith
            LONDON (Reuters) - So many German spies were swarming around
Britain before World War I that German military leaders knew
more about most towns and villages than the local policemen,
according to 90-year-old records released Monday.
            Germany's spies were not necessarily brilliant enough to
pass on great qualities of information, but Britain was doing
nothing to stop them, the records of Britain's highly secretive
intelligence services showed.
            So inept was British security at the turn of the century
that a German man-of-war anchored in daylight at the naval port
of Plymouth and waited while an officer went ashore and
photographed every gun platform.
            ``A German general landing a force in East Anglia would know
more about the country than any British general,'' observed a
top-secret guide to Britain's newly-formed internal security
service, now known as MI5, in 1909.
            ``More about each town than its own British mayor and would
have his information so methodically arranged that he could in a
few minutes give you the answer to any question you asked him
about any town, village or position in that area.''
            Such realizations came as a shock to Britons, then
accustomed to rule a vast empire and fondly attached to
gentlemanly codes. ``The English thought being a spy was
dishonorable,'' said espionage author Michael Smith.
            ``Throughout that period, spying had a stigma about it. The
English didn't want anyone watching them at home, although doing
it abroad wasn't so bad.''
            The naivet of the British became apparent to the service's
first detective, William Melville, when he tried to warn a local
policeman about a German who had taken photographs of railroad
bridges.
            ``I am sure you are right; I believe these fellows are the
authors of nearly all the burglaries we have around the
country,'' the policeman replied.
            In the early days of the service, Melville, a retired London
police detective, had to do all the surveillance work himself or
rely on friends to help out.
            ``Mr. Melville...in view of his age and standing can hardly
be expected to perform such work as the shadowing by night and
day,'' wrote the service's head, Capt. Vernon Kell, known as
``K,'' asking for more staff.
            At the start of the war, the security service had only 19
staff. But it had compiled a register of all foreigners in
Britain and police had details of 22 paid German agents, all but
one of whom were arrested when war broke out.
            During the war, 11 spies were executed in the Tower of
London, the fortress where many of British history's best-known
figures lost their lives.
            The work of the security service was helped by the
nonchalance and ineptitude of German spies. Many of them were
easily singled out by their strong accents and erratic behavior.
            A spy referred to as Herr H rented a remote mill and
farmhouse in southern England where he played host to a series
of German guests, but left the mill idle and did no farming
beyond breeding a few ducks.
            Many of the spies relied on primitive methods that the
security service had no trouble in detecting. They used milk,
lemon juice and urine to write invisible ``messages,'' although
they also had more sophisticated devices.
            The security service's scientists discovered a substance,
impregnated in spies' clothes, shoe laces or tobacco, which when
soaked in water produced ``invisible ink.''
         ^REUTERS@