Mr Fields and wife Joanne, who have been together for almost 20 years and married for 13 years, said "hundreds" of people had approached them about the accusations that he had been unfaithful over the past three months and had left his wife for another man. He said the most hurtful impact was when the rumours reached parents and pupils at Swanland Primary School, where his children, Joseph, 10, Jazzmyn, 11, and Francesca, 7, attend.
Mr Fields, 43, of Hessle, said: "We are happily married and this is just idle gossip. "It's a shame that people just pass on gossip without any thought for the consequences and without questioning it. We had to sit the children all down and explain to them that someone was being nasty to us. The oldest understood better but Francesca asked us who she will be living with. I worry about them getting bullied at the school as children can be nasty.
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"Joanne is upset too. She gets looks from some parents when she picks the kids up as if they are saying 'that's her whose husband ran off with a man." The butcher said he had no idea where the rumour began. Brian was keen to point out in the specially-printed shop signs he has nothing against anyone who is gay. He said: "I have gay family members and gay friends and I believe in 'each to their own'. I took action because I didn't want my customers thinking I had been unfaithful and dishonest."
7 comments:
Why, if he indeed is totally OK with gay people, did he feel the need to proclaim he is not gay in the first place? He is already married, after all, so he has no need to attract women. He has nothing against gay people as long as people don't think he is one. Could be worse, I guess.
In any case, I think the sign has way too much text in it. He could just have written: "Please ignore the malicious rumour claiming I have left my family, it is entirely false and spreading it hurts my wife and children."
Insolitus, if he put up a notice denying all the rumours but left out the whole "I'm not gay" part, it would stand out and people would speculate as to why he didn't deny being gay. And so the whole mess would continue.
He's just covering all bases.
So let them speculate, why should he care? In his own words he's happily married and has no problem with gay people. That means he can't be insulted by it. That means it won't ruin his chances with the local women. If he really means what he says, the gay part of the rumour is irrelevant to him, the harmful part he is objecting to is the leaving his family and divorce part that has also made his children upset.
If there was some nasty rumour about me circulating in my neighbourhood, maybe calling me a tax evader, a convicted rapist and having Jewish blood, I would try to correct the first two, false rumours that would be hurtful, harmful and insulting to me. I would not try to argue that I don't have any Jewish blood, even though that's actually true, because I don't think there's anything wrong with having Jewish blood and denying the third part with the two other parts would, in a way, equate the three. If I said I am not a tax evader, nor a rapist, nor have I any Jewish blood, I feel I would be insulting Jewish people. That's my thought process with this one.
Reading the letter makes it pretty clear he's just covering his bases.
And you have to suppose that many people simply don't liked being called something they are not.
I doubt he would be correcting a false rumour claiming he was qualified for a Mensa membership.
"successful and in the public eye" ok that's one way to describe your local butcher
Seems like a case for Shakespeare from the passage ( he who doth protest to much)
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