The following article appears as part of the Unspun: Scottish Politics newsletter.

Journalists aren’t supposed to ‘look away’. We’re meant to observe the world dispassionately, in all its splendour and horror, and then report reality back to the people. 

I once prided myself on that ability. Increasingly, though, I find myself needing to look away. The sadism and cruelty in the world feel like a tide rising around your throat, coming up to your chin and threatening to drown you.

Sometimes, it's the relentless horror of wars abroad - genocide, atrocity, ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity - which makes you want to look away: the bestial malice that lies within this species of ours. 

Often, though - indeed increasingly - it’s events at home which demand you shut your eyes. That’s all the more disturbing as the monsters aren’t far away, they’re next door.

I struggle to just look at the face of Axel Rudakubana, who murdered those three little girls at their dance class in Southport. A sense of physical disgust wells up, so profound that I’ll turn the page or change the channel should I see him.

This morning, as I read the news, I felt the same need to look away - the same sense of overwhelming disgust. 

There is, we now know, a gang of young men operating in Scotland luring and coercing children - particularly young girls - into acts of appalling self-harm online so they can watch for their pleasure.

SNP must demand broadcasting powers after death of BBC Scotland........

© Herald Scotland