“Nobody ever lost a dollar underestimating the taste of the public.” This was P T Barnum, showman and scam artist, speaking over a century ago. Barnum was a circus man, a philanthropist and shameless promoter. In many ways he was a portent of things to come for with this remark Barnum has summed up nicely the maxim that drives the publication of Britain’s raucous redtops. Society has always had a taste for scandal, but should the tabloids be whetting our appetite?

The questionable legality and morality of the practices of Britain’s press has not been far removed from headlines. The Leveson Inquiry, launched in 2011, and its subsequent report published in November 2012 has seen massive media coverage. The inquiry was instigated after the illegal interception of phone messages by The News of the World and explored the ethics and tactics of modern journalism particularly focusing on the tabloids. But where Leveson focused on the scope of the freedom of the press or “What can the press publish?” the wider question may be “Why do they publish what they publish?”

This is a recurring question that crops up time and again. Last week the Daily Mail ran a story on Antonia de Sancha, best known as one time mistress of former Cabinet Minister David Mellor, an affair which became public in 1992. The story was entitled “Pictured 20 years on; Antonia de Sancha at 51” and in its entirety was comprised of two side by side photos, one of Miss de Sancha in her early thirties, another an unflattering shot depicting her smoking outside of a Nottinghill restaurant and a reiteration of the facts of the Mellor affair.

Why publish a story like this? Professor Roy Greenslade argues against any justification. He has attacked the publication in his online Guardian blog, describing the article as “chauvinistic and disgraceful.” He ends his criticism by stating “There simply was no point to it beyond demeaning the woman.” Even some Daily Mail readers are confused, one commentator on the website asking “And the “news” is?”

 Of course the answer has nothing to do with the newsworthiness of the article and has everything to do with our appetite for the story. The Daily Mail and all our other tabloids understand their target audience and niche well. Bankers delve into the Financial Times on the commute home, teenage girls giggle over Marie Claire and when the people of Britain want light reading and something to gossip about they reach for the redtops. News is business and selling papers is success.

So how do our tabloids sell papers? They give us what we want to read. Since Leveson there has been debate over what lies in the realm of public interest, a concept which has been suggested as a guideline for the ethical publication of news stories. But there is a dilemma here, although many things are interesting to the public, what really constitutes a matter of public interest?

This is the centre of the debate. There can be no doubt that there is definite public interest in unattractive images of a woman who was once the beautiful mistress of an eminent politician. We the public have great appetite for these fall from grace stories, a collective schadenfreude that compels us to buy and read newspapers full of such tales. From Susan Boyle to Michael Barrymore, tabloids make real people characters and make their lives a narrative, a serial we can follow day-by-day, week on week. Yes, we the people will buy as our tastes dictate. But, if individual privacy and our sense of fundamental moral decency are in danger, can our tabloids justify selling as their pockets dictate?