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Paper Monitor

09:29 UK time, Wednesday, 4 August 2010

A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.

Allow Paper Monitor to indulge in a spot of navel gazing, if you will.

Those of you lucky enough to live in parts of the UK where you can chance upon a copy of Metro on your morning commute may have spotted a list of 20 on page three.

It reprints the list compiled by none other than the Magazine last week of movies that make men cry.

No ordinary men, either, but you. So take a bow, dear readers. Paper Monitor applauds Metro for recognising the weight of your opinions.

However, Paper Monitor must temper this rare dalliance with vanity by expressing concern about the obsession with image apparent in many of the day's newspapers.

Chef Gordon Ramsay, we are told in the Daily Mail, has had a "smile makeover" in the form of teeth veneers.

The old almost snaggle-toothed look is gone. Now the Ramsay grin is a lot brighter, straighter and dare it be said, gleaming enough to rival the dazzling Simon Cowell.

It seems odd for a bloke whose grizzly persona is the key to his riches to want to smooth off his rough edges. Paper Monitor wonders if Ramsay will be so keen to polish his language.

On the same page, the Mail reports the results of a survey suggesting half of all men fear going grey above all other signs of ageing.

What, with that and the Guardian - among others - reporting the results of academic research on the vital issue of whether the all-over tan is achievable, it is no wonder the Guides are getting worked up.

The Times reports that research carried out by Girlguiding UK found half of girls aged 16 to 21 would have surgery to improve their looks.

And many of the youngsters have decided enough is enough.

More than 20,000 girls have signed a petition urging David Cameron to intervene and force magazines to tell readers when photographs have been digitally enhanced. They say that airbrushing is undermining the self-confidence of an entire generation.

More power to their arm, in Paper Monitor's view.

All this leaves Paper Monitor wondering whether the human race has evolved as much as it would like to think - particularly when it comes to attracting a mate.

The Independent describes an eligible bachelor "from a stable family background" who takes a healthy interest in the opposite sex and is ready to settle down.

But Kesho, an 11-year-old gorilla born in Dublin Zoo, might need more than the luck of the Irish in his bid for a harmonious relationship as the leader of a "harem of three lonely females" at London Zoo.

The move is both delicate and essential because the social organisation of a band of gorillas is centred on the dominant male and without such a leader, the female grouping at London Zoo is likely to split apart in acrimonious bickering, experts believe.

Paper Monitor suggests Kesho will need more than a bright smile to succeed.

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