I have been shocked recently at the horrible news coverage of Coleen McLoughlin who is the girlfriend of Wayne Rooney.

Comments have centred around her dress sense, her ‘chaviness’, how she has no rights to this, that or the other. Comments have been very personal, spiteful and hard to read yet along receive as being said about you.

This is not just some celebrity that is being harangued here. This is a 19 year old girl. An impressionable teenager who has need and hangups like every other teenager. A young person who is growing and developing, struggling to find her place in society and discovering her role and journey. This is a difficult enough task for teenagers as it is, this poor girl is extremely unfortunate that she has to make her ‘growing up mistakes’ in front of the worlds media; and just because she is in a relationship with a talented young man.

Why can’t people give this poor girl a break. Let her grow up without the whole world dissecting each mistake she makes. In fact, just let her grow up and try to remember what it was like to be young and the stress and pain of all that discovery.

I hate the hypocrisy of our press in things like this. How many of us ‘adults’ did not get drunk when we were younger, or had a relationship we regret, or did things we are embarrassed about now. I am thankful that I committed most of my youthful misdemeanours in front of a few friends (and a quite irite mother!) rather than millions of people.

This attack on our young seems to be becoming more regular in the press; it has happened to Prince Harry, Euan Blair and others. These are just our children who need our guidance and protection as they develop into adults. I think it shows that society is in a pretty poor state when the press, and others, think it is acceptable to pull apart and assassinate the characters of our young people.

A nation that sacrifices it’s children is a nation of poor moral fibre. I can’t help but think there should be a role here for us to speak out and point out what is happening. Can this be changed? How can it be changed? Is there a role for us, as church, here? Should we be speaking out against such treatment of our vulnerable young?