Thread: Daily Mail, Bullshit Mountain, lurch to the right, Hatred - what do we actually do? Board: Purgatory / Ship of Fools.
To visit this thread, use this URL:
http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=2;t=020011
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
:
I had a moan here in the hot place about this, but this is meant to be a positive thread.
This has made me realise that clicktivism isn't enough. We can sit here telling each other how terrible the Daily Mail is, like the Judaean People's Front, but it's not going to stop the steady drip of bullshit, nor change the minds of the readership who've been fed this bullshit for years, day in, day out, so (as the constant crop of bollocks shared on social media shows) they are totally ready to believe that every Muslim is a terrorist sympathiser, that every asylum seeker is instantly handed a half million pound house, that illegal immigrants can claim more in benefits than pensioners, that Christmas is banned to keep Muslims happy, and all the other crap that goes to make up Bullshit Mountain, where the readers are made to believe they live. Honest people will always lose a propaganda war because by definition they don't have the weapon of dishonesty available to them. So, friends, what can we - can I - actually do?
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
As for Israel, pacifism, Trump absolutely nothing ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Not our problem beyond our immediate responsibilities in our lives.
Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on
:
What I'm going to do is ask that my publisher no longer sends my books to them for review. I'm also going to add that I'd prefer it if they didn't send any of their books to them for review.
To be honest, the casual Mail reader is both almost exactly not my target audience, and almost exactly is my target audience, in that if I can get them to actually *think*, I'd have done some good.
But otherwise, no: I'm not going to help them in any way.
Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I had a moan here in the hot place about this, but this is meant to be a positive thread.
This has made me realise that clicktivism isn't enough. We can sit here telling each other how terrible the Daily Mail is, like the Judaean People's Front, but it's not going to stop the steady drip of bullshit, nor change the minds of the readership who've been fed this bullshit for years, day in, day out, so (as the constant crop of bollocks shared on social media shows) they are totally ready to believe that every Muslim is a terrorist sympathiser, that every asylum seeker is instantly handed a half million pound house, that illegal immigrants can claim more in benefits than pensioners, that Christmas is banned to keep Muslims happy, and all the other crap that goes to make up Bullshit Mountain, where the readers are made to believe they live. Honest people will always lose a propaganda war because by definition they don't have the weapon of dishonesty available to them. So, friends, what can we - can I - actually do?
I think one answer that needs to be part of the mix is the hard one - engagement with the people who think utterly differently to the liberal "mainstream." The reason I put that workd in scare quotes is not expressing my own disapproval as much as pointing out that I think it's probably not the majority thinking people thought it was.
I was actually quite hopeful in the aftermath of Brexit that educated people were going to have to climb down the mountain a bit and engage with the fact that for many people the world doesn't work the way it seems to for them, and the obvious truths are not either obvious or true for many either.
I don't mean that they should change the way they think (or what they think) to be more like the majority, but something needs to be done to address the fact that there is a yawning chasm for example between how I see the world as someone with 2 degrees and a relative ly liberal outlook (albeit on here I'm probably squarely right of centre), and how my brother sees it, who is a carpenter in a depressed part of the Black Country and flits between UKIP and Corbynism (and sees both of them as broadly similar potential answers to his problems).
If you look at the comments below that awful Mail article referenced in the hell thread, you can see a lot of people writing things like "you should try living round here, it's a real concern." Now, I've spent enough time in depressed parts of England in the last year or so to know that's probably true. I'd agree entirely that it's open to question how much it a should be a concern or b is legitimate, but the genius of the Mail is it's ability to leverage those concerns.
At the base of a ludicrous headline and an appalling article is the germ of enough truth to give it all traction. I'm not even saying that the the truth is true, but it is true to say that people do believe like that, and think like that.
Ultimately, there needs to be some sort of rapprochement between the elite (by which I mean anyone with a world view that extends to more than 10 miles from the town they were born in) and everyone else. The more I see of this year, the more I think people who can see further than the town they were born in may well be in a numerical minority in the UK sadly.
I've got no idea how to do that, or what the whole answer is, but part of the answer is to address the disconnect between the worldview of say SoF and the worldview of someone on a sink estate in Tipton, or Batley, or Wakefield.
So, easy enough then...
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
I think one answer that needs to be part of the mix is the hard one - engagement with the people who think utterly differently to the liberal "mainstream."
Yup. For our constituency here, they are the "tax collectors and sinners". Go for it.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
I think these are dangerous times. I don't think Le Pen, Farage and Trump are fascists, but there is a shift to the right, the far right, and proto-fascism. The killing of Jo Cox is a warning.
As to what one does, obviously, that is a personal decision. Mine is to campaign against the far right, in so far as I am able, and also against the foul racism, which is found more and more on the internet, and of course, in the media.
People tell me I'm being alarmist, yes, they said that in the 30s, when the Nazis were gathering. The left were ridiculously insouciant, some of them saying, let the Nazis take power, it'll be our turn next.
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
I think one answer that needs to be part of the mix is the hard one - engagement with the people who think utterly differently to the liberal "mainstream."
Yup. For our constituency here, they are the "tax collectors and sinners". Go for it.
How? What do I actually concretely do? How do I respond when someone tells me all the council houses go to the "fucking immigrants"? Try to prove them wrong? Agree with them (even though I know it's bullshit)?
It's all very well saying "engage" but I haven't a clue how to engage.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
Well, people in the Labour party go into the estates, and argue with the racists and even the fascists. No doubt, they are fighting for their political lives, since these were Labour redoubts once.
That seems quite brave to me, but then they have been going into council estates since the year dot.
Fair enough, if politics isn't your bag.
Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Well, people in the Labour party go into the estates, and argue with the racists and even the fascists. No doubt, they are fighting for their political lives, since these were Labour redoubts once.
That seems quite brave to me, but then they have been going into council estates since the year dot.
Fair enough, if politics isn't your bag.
To be scrupulously fair, the Tories and the Liberals stick the heads above the parapets on those estates too - and, yes, you're right. Frankly that is brave, or at least you need a lot of nerve. I've done canvassing in the past, and it is soul destroying even in the "nice" areas.
Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
"you should try living round here, it's a real concern."
A mile-wide asteroid ploughing into the Atlantic and producing a tsunami that covers the entire eastern seaboard of the US to the Appalachians is also a real concern.
Actually, it's more real than the council taking away someone's house and giving it to immigrants.
The problem is not whether the concern is real. It's whether the concern is based on anything resembling factual evidence. And that's where the constant drip-drip (more of an open tap gushing sewage in the case of the Daily Heil) of false - deliberately false - information has such a corrosive effect.
So the headline "Did Jo Cox's killer fear that his house would be taken away and given to immigrants?" is possibly true. Perhaps he did. Was that fear based on reality? No more than his White Supremacist ideology.
I can acknowledge a concern, while at the same time robustly and determinedly debunking it. I don't have to appease it in any way. And I have nothing but utter contempt for the fearmongers who knowingly peddle such bile.
Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
"you should try living round here, it's a real concern."
A mile-wide asteroid ploughing into the Atlantic and producing a tsunami that covers the entire eastern seaboard of the US to the Appalachians is also a real concern.
Actually, it's more real than the council taking away someone's house and giving it to immigrants.
The problem is not whether the concern is real. It's whether the concern is based on anything resembling factual evidence. And that's where the constant drip-drip (more of an open tap gushing sewage in the case of the Daily Heil) of false - deliberately false - information has such a corrosive effect.
So the headline "Did Jo Cox's killer fear that his house would be taken away and given to immigrants?" is possibly true. Perhaps he did. Was that fear based on reality? No more than his White Supremacist ideology.
I can acknowledge a concern, while at the same time robustly and determinedly debunking it. I don't have to appease it in any way. And I have nothing but utter contempt for the fearmongers who knowingly peddle such bile.
for the edification of people who haven't read every post, please can I make it crystal clear that Doc Tor has just quoted a made-up quote from my post based on an amalgam of the wider shores of the Mail's comments thread, and not a quote of what I think. Because that's unfortunately what it looks like...
Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
for the edification of people who haven't read every post, please can I make it crystal clear that Doc Tor has just quoted a made-up quote from my post based on an amalgam of the wider shores of the Mail's comments thread, and not a quote of what I think. Because that's unfortunately what it looks like...
And for the edification of those same people, I was quoting betjemaniac not because I believed he thinks that, but because he posted a made-up quote based on an amalgam of Mail comment threads.
My beef is not with betjemaniac necessarily, unless he genuinely does think that real concerns based on groundless suppositions should be treated as actual problems to be solved rather than falsehoods to be debunked.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
How? What do I actually concretely do? How do I respond when someone tells me all the council houses go to the "fucking immigrants"? Try to prove them wrong? Agree with them (even though I know it's bullshit)?
It's all very well saying "engage" but I haven't a clue how to engage.
Mileage varies depending on circumstances.
In specific instances, I will challenge prejudices. That depends on me having some sort of a relationship with the prejudiced person.
Opportunites for that vary; the only thing that is certain is that such relationships involve going against our natural inclinations.
Also, the success or otherwise of our enagement depends on our agenda. If it's political, we'll miss the point. If it's disinterested love for our neighbour that sees beyond their politics to who they are as a person, perhaps not.
I'm not saying I'm necessarily very good at any of this, but I think opportunities exist for all of us.
[ 25. November 2016, 11:04: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
Just to say, that I grew up in Oldham, which has its fair number of racists and fascists, yet in the last by-election there, in 2015, Labour increased its majority, despite predictions that they would lose it. UKIP came second.
Another example: the BNP had gained support in parts of East London, but they lost all their council seats in 2010, partly because of a concerted anti-fascist campaign by different groups.
There is no need to be passive and fatalistic.
Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on
:
We can start by exposing and repeating the lies and select quoting (akin to proof-texting) that the Daily Mail has done for approaching a century. We can start with the Zinoviev letter (along with the Express, which is as bad) and the Mail's opposition to accepting Jewish refugees from Germany and other European countries in the 1930's.
This needs to be done as widely as possible, by the most reputable means possible, until those deluded by the Mail's hatred of anyone different are no longer so unquestioning of the printed or spoken word.
Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
My beef is not with betjemaniac necessarily, unless he genuinely does think that real concerns based on groundless suppositions should be treated as actual problems to be solved rather than falsehoods to be debunked.
No, I thought my post was pretty clear that I think real concerns based on groundless suppositions are themselves the problem to be solved. I'm tying myself up in knots here, clearly. Short cut - yes I agree with you.
The big issue is that it would be quite easy to restrain/ban the Mail (well, it wouldn't, but I can see how it would be a solution that could be pursued). The problem will come with the perhaps millions of people who still believe that bollocks anyway. The hard question is the "falsehood debunking" strategy for the millions of individuals, because that's what needs to be done, and I don't have any answers to that one.
So, back to Karl's question, what can the individual do debunk falsehoods?
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
Also relevant, the famous DM headline, 'Hurrah for the Blackshirts', printed in 1934. Some people say this is ancient history, so what.
We are facing dangers from the far right and proto-fascism, so we fight back.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
So, back to Karl's question, what can the individual do debunk falsehoods?
There is certainly a role for doing so: see Snopes.
But no amount of angry blogposts can match actual human engagement.
It's the same for violent extremism.
I firmly believe that if the battle against radicalisation is to be won, it will be by radicalised people being struck by interaction with those they have been taught to believe to be evil not behaving as predicted in their narrative.
I may not have many intellectual conversations with inmates in danger of radicalisation, but if they can recall at least one Christian as "that bloke who shook my hand, smiled at me, and took an interest" then I have some hope that a seed of doubt might just be planted.
[ 25. November 2016, 11:19: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
I think one answer that needs to be part of the mix is the hard one - engagement with the people who think utterly differently to the liberal "mainstream."
Yup. For our constituency here, they are the "tax collectors and sinners". Go for it.
It's a good point - but I don't know any. I have a wide, very wide, circle of friends in RL but I don't know anyone who is anti immigrant. Some of my friends work with asylum seekers, others run a soup kitchen in town. The rest are very left wing/socialist in outlook. Where do I find these racists to engage in conversation?
Online? I seem to live in a bubble/echo chamber there too.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
I think one answer that needs to be part of the mix is the hard one - engagement with the people who think utterly differently to the liberal "mainstream."
Yup. For our constituency here, they are the "tax collectors and sinners". Go for it.
It's a good point - but I don't know any. I have a wide, very wide, circle of friends in RL but I don't know anyone who is anti immigrant. Some of my friends work with asylum seekers, others run a soup kitchen in town. The rest are very left wing/socialist in outlook. Where do I find these racists to engage in conversation?
Online? I seem to live in a bubble/echo chamber there too.
I'm curious where you live. If you join any political organization, you will bump up against racists and proto-fascists quite quickly, as they are out there, hating Muslims and the EU, and all the rest of it.
It's true that in my part of London, there is less of it, and there was a 70% Remain vote in my neck of the woods. Go to East London though.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
In fact, I live part of the time in Norfolk, and the air is thick with anti-gypsy and anti-foreigners rhetoric. My neighbour is Lithuanian, a very nice guy, nicer than many of the English!
About 75% vote for Leave, bloody hell.
Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
Online? I seem to live in a bubble/echo chamber there too.
I'm interested in what people think, so I'm involved in quite a few online forums apart from this. Almost every professional football club has a forum, with an off-topic page where non-football is discussed. Frankly, the range of views tends to be wider than you get on here because you've got everyone from out and out underclass through to middle class football fans.
Perhaps reassuringly, if you've never looked at one, the bad/wrong/loony views tend to get shouted down - but they are expressed, and by more than one person. Similarly, some of the best threads I've ever read, and they go up to several hundred pages very quickly because of the sheer number of posters, are on the Army Rumour Service. It's no holds barred debate, with all-comers holding their corner, but even there the idiots get found out quickly and called on it.
I like SoF, I post here and find the threads stimulating (otherwise, why would I bother?), but really it's an incredibly tame place a lot of the time. *not* a criticism, otherwise it would be posted in the Styx, but more diverse parts of the internet are available if you want to engage with people who think differently - without having to go anywhere near out and out racist forums.
Seriously, have a read of your local football club fans forum off-topic section. Even if you don't join and engage, I guarantee you'll hear different views being expressed and challenged. I'm not even a football fan, but I can recommend having a look at the off-topic section of the Oxford Utd forum, as a good example of discussion on everything from Brexit to immigration to local government.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
Online? I seem to live in a bubble/echo chamber there too.
I really would forget online. It simply isn't real life. Just spending too much time online is to be in an echo chamber.
In the real world, the challenge is to get outside our bubble. I have a job where I can sometimes do this relatively easily, but I'm very aware I'm in a privileged position that way.
As I say, all our circumstances vary. Often, you can't plan this sort of thing. It's about developing an attitude that can be implemented when the opportunity arises.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
I don't agree with that. Online is part of life, and I campaign against fascism and far-right politics there, as elsewhere. I don't see the need to separate compartments in life, and say that one compartment isn't real. The fascists exist there, so I fight them, as I would anywhere.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
One can do so, but I think nothing replaces real-life interaction, and online impact can be self-deceptive.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
I am glad for anything that anyone can do to combat racism and the far right, I'm not fussy about methods or motives really. I had an old friend who was very ill, and could only manage to write articles and stuff like that, but he packed a punch, by gum.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
Of course if you can't get out and about then online is good. But it is all to easy online to forget there's a real world of people out there, not a few of them functionally illiterate and/or with little time or inclination to devote to reading.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
In both support of and contradiction to all that, I have just gone down the road to the post office and amused myself by peeling off what I could of a nasty new alt-right sticker on a lamp-post on my route.
Posted by Bishops Finger (# 5430) on
:
Well done! I once threw away (behind the radiator) a whole batch of BNP trash some git had left in my local library...
....mony a mickle maks a muckle, as they say...
IJ
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
What I'm going to do is ask that my publisher no longer sends my books to them for review.
Is this entirely the right thing to do? I'm in sympathy with campaigns to ask advertisers not to buy space in the Daily Mail because that hits the Mail where it hurts.
But I don't think the Mail is going to be kept in business by publishers sending it free fantasy novels to review. And I think it's better that the Mail alert its readers to the existence of a book like e.g. Downstation than to the existence of something by the neo-fascists who are currently cluttering up the Hugos. A book like Downstation can I hope only make its readers better people. That's assuming that the worst the Mail did was to call it something like dutifully multicultural in the course of an otherwise positive review. If the review was just a rant, then yes, boycott away.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
I notice that the DM is now throwing heavy artillery towards the various statistics that are coming out, which seem to show that the most wonderfullest of Brexits, is not all it's cracked up to be. Stats showing low wages, low growth, low investment - nonsense! Just Remainers having a tantrum. Trouble is, the government probably listen to this nonsense.
[ 25. November 2016, 13:27: Message edited by: quetzalcoatl ]
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I notice that the DM is now throwing heavy artillery towards the various statistics that are coming out, which seem to show that the most wonderfullest of Brexits, is not all it's cracked up to be. Stats showing low wages, low growth, low investment - nonsense! Just Remainers having a tantrum. Trouble is, the government probably listen to this nonsense.
They're probably the source of the nonsense.
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
Karl:
Might it not help if you didn't talk such bullshit yourself? You may well hate the Daily Mail, but really . . .
I know a (very) few Mail readers. I have not yet met anyone who believes that quote:
every Muslim is a terrorist sympathiser, that every asylum seeker is instantly handed a half million pound house, that illegal immigrants can claim more in benefits than pensioners, that Christmas is banned to keep Muslims happy.
If you think that this represents the editorial stance of the Mail, you need chapter and verse. If you says it's just "exaggeration for effect" then maybe you have been to the Steve Bannon school of journalism.
I don't like the Mail and do not read it. I have started to read Breitbart, to see what it actually says as opposed to what people think it says. And to oppose them you have to be carefully forensic and stick rigidly to what they actually say. Otherwise you are attacking vitriol with virtiol and deceptions with deceptions. And it's hard - I know - as they are subtle and will use veiled words to convey something, but with credible deniability.
So as far as I can see, you are correct in stating that the Mail is indeed suggesting that the loss of his house (and the Mail is hardly against moving people out of houses they don't need and did point out that an alternative was on offer) may have been a factor in Mair going berserk.
I can see why you would criticize this, but then I often find coverage of murders distasteful, and papers scramble to find some other human interest angle. People always want to explain this type of action. And those who are unwilling to see anything beyond his neo-nazi obsession are also seeking a master explanation, and are keen to dismiss the idea that mental problems are behind it all.
I don't know, and I suggest nobody does know, what was going through his mind. And arguably, those who want to dig in the dirt should leave well alone.
But over-reaction and bile doesn't solve the issue, and only gives fuel to those who believe that enraged liberals are no more concerned with the facts that enraged conservatives.
Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
Frankly, the range of views tends to be wider than you get on here because you've got everyone from out and out underclass through to middle class football fans.
I do something similar and agree with you - up to a point. Though Eutychus is correct that that merely by being online and requiring a certain element of literacy, these forums have a certain filter to them.
Also, most of them tend to have a much greater proportion of males to females than the ship.
[Edited to resolve quoting disaster]
[ 25. November 2016, 20:57: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
:
Anteater, I did not say that was the editorial stance of the Mail. It is, however, the position held by some of its readers, as is readily shown hy reading the comments section, and it frequently uses stories and stances that feed that sort of position, without ever articulating it that way itself. It's clever that way.
Posted by alienfromzog (# 5327) on
:
I think the answer is multifactorial but:
- the lies must be fought with the truth.
One of several anti-Mail websites - sadly no longer current but you may recognise this guest author... - Pressure on government to adopt Leverson properly
- Joining Stop Funding Hate is also a good idea (link not given to conform with forum rules: just Google)
for starters...
One other thought though. I think the label 'elite' is part of the Daily Mail web of propaganda. I probably meet most definitions of the 'liberal elite' that are thrown around. I have two degrees and multiple post-graduate qualifications... but my daily life means that I am constantly in contact with those in society who feel left behind.
I am a paediatric surgeon. As such, my professional life is that very scientific / academic culture. Which is, of course another echo chamber. However in healthcare, those from lower socio-economic groups are always over-represented. This is especially true in paediatrics hence I am constantly in contact with the disaffected. The idea that I am somehow aloof and not in touch is totally ridiculous.
It is of course an obscene conceit and hipocracy when spouted by newspapers owned by billionaires and (in the case of the Mail, edited by a multimillionaire).
I am sure many will recoil at this essay as it's written by Alastair Campbell but it is insightful and makes some good points (whilst only very occasionally becoming polemic).
AFZ
Posted by hatless (# 3365) on
:
I see The Mail and UKIP and others (Trump seems significantly different) telling a story about fear. A little nation at risk, being taken advantage of by bullies and overrun by those with low cunning. We are presented as weak and poor, the little we have pouring through our useless fingers. The narrative both warns us of dangers while undermining self-belief, and that's where I think the right wing rage comes from, the noisy spite of the desperate.
Another story talks about confidence. It reminds us of our strength and depth, our connections and creativity. It acknowledges risks and obstacles, but anticipates flexible, collaborative responses. It manages to laugh at fear. It is attractive because it tells us that we are attractive.
But The Mail tells one story very well, and the other one, though told by a million parents to their children when life is too much for them, is not much heard in the market place.
Tragically, the Church seems to me to have adopted the narrative and identity of fear, putting its faith in church growth schemes, so we don't tell the alternative so well any more. But perhaps it's a story better told with an arm round a shoulder than in bold capitals.
Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
A little nation at risk, being taken advantage of by bullies and overrun by those with low cunning. We are presented as weak and poor, the little we have pouring through our useless fingers.
Interestingly, this sounds very like the narrative a lot of Remainers were pushing. An insignificant island nation too small and poor to make it on our own, and needing the EU to protect us from the Tories and Kippers and give us any chance of future prosperity.
Posted by Goldfish Stew (# 5512) on
:
It strikes me that extreme views seem to thrive in an environment that their advocates can paint as "stifling" or "silencing" those views.
These views need good counter-rebuttal. Out of interest I had a look at the mail online version to see the full article:
* Several times the article describes the murderer as a neo-nazi, bigot and is generally unsympathetic to him, in spite of headlining and opening with a "here's how immigration may have triggered this ticking time bomb."
* Acknowledging this is just a theory, the author notes we've never heard Mair's voice on this and describes his request to address the court after the conviction as "callous and calculating"
* There's also a few comments made about his state of mental health
* The comments section is full of varying views, but in general, those which are more right wing extreme are less commonly seen, and voted down with lots of red versus green votes. The top rated comment at present states that the tone of the leave campaign has a lot to answer for
So yes, there's a lack of perspective in how the mail headlined the story, but overall it reads as an article questioning how this could happen. The neo-nazi obsession, white supremacist issues and background of reclusive paranoia are definitely noted, almost as the tinderbox that needed a spark. The spark that the headline offers is not well substantiated, and very flimsy. But interestingly the readers who commented online have called them out on that.
If the comments section is anything to go by, there's definitely a substantial cohort of readers (majority if the votes haven't been affected by board flooding) who are prepared and able to debate against such views.
So healthy debate has a place. It seems to me that things like withdrawing books for review from the mail (particularly books that contribute to a more balanced view of society) won't add to healthy debate, but instead will allow the concentration of extreme viewpoint.
Posted by Russ (# 120) on
:
Re: "lurch to the right"
When I was taught to drive, the instructor told me that if you make lots of small steering corrections it saves you having to make sudden large ones. (With sudden large ones being more likely to over-correct leading to a crash...)
The Brexit vote seemed to me like people suddenly getting a chance to say "none of that" when they've wanted for years to say "less of that" but that option wasn't on the ballot paper.
The far right are deeply unattractive. But if you believe in a left-to-right spectrum of opinion with a vaguely normal distribution, there are far more people in the moderate right then the far right.
And if you tell those people for long enough that their concerns (about immigration or political correctness or anything else) make them no different from the far right then they'll end up on the far right.
Don't make an unbridgable chasm between the political centre and the majority of Daily Mail readers. Make the chasm between the far right and the moderates of every hue.
Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Don't make an unbridgable chasm between the political centre and the majority of Daily Mail readers. Make the chasm between the far right and the moderates of every hue.
The problem is not between the readers of the Telegraph and the far right. It's between the readers of the Mail and the far right.
The Mail has been producing headlines now for years that wouldn't disgrace the front page of The Stormer, and there came a point when a moderate centre right person picking up a copy of the Mail would have said, "Steady on, old chap. That's a bit much."
We are long past that point now. So if the people who read the Mail don't want to be seen as xenophobic, homophobic, nationalist shills, then there are other papers - in fact, most other papers - that will cater to their political outlook. They choose to continue to read, and support through their money, the Mail.
That's their choice. That's not me driving a wedge between the centre ground and the right. That's them choosing to stand with the far right, for whatever reason.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
I don't see the moderate right being told that they are the same as the far right. Who is doing this? Well, the far right might do it, of course, as a kind of recruitment to their own cause.
I don't go around calling John Major or David Cameron fascists, and anyone who does, is a dip-stick.
Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
So if the people who read the Mail don't want to be seen as xenophobic, homophobic, nationalist shills, then there are other papers - in fact, most other papers - that will cater to their political outlook.
But are there really? Mail readers see themselves as being a cut or two above the red-tops, and the real papers use long complicated words and don't spend so much time on the doings of the Kardashian clan. Unless the UK press has grown considerably in the years since I left, I'm not sure that the selection is as wide as you imply.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Also relevant, the famous DM headline, 'Hurrah for the Blackshirts', printed in 1934. Some people say this is ancient history, so what.
We are facing dangers from the far right and proto-fascism, so we fight back.
The Daily Mirror supported them more.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
The Mail online loves the Kardashians, and features many pictures of cleavages, and daring bikinis. It's pro-feminist, you see.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Also relevant, the famous DM headline, 'Hurrah for the Blackshirts', printed in 1934. Some people say this is ancient history, so what.
We are facing dangers from the far right and proto-fascism, so we fight back.
The Daily Mirror supported them more.
In fact, Cecil King (Mirror chairman), never seems to have given up his fondness for Mosley, and was still touting him in the 60s. This was the time of the supposed coup against Harold Wilson, although I don't know if this was a real thing or a conspiracy theory. Allegedly, King consulted various military figures and Lord Mountbatten to sound out their interest in a coup.
Posted by Ariel (# 58) on
:
FYI, at least 25,000 people have been tweeting in celebration of Jo Cox's murder.
Obviously, that doesn't include people on Facebook or people who were thinking it but haven't said anything.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
One in two thousand of us counted, therefore one in a thousand. Times ten for luck? One in a hundred. The same level as psychopaths in the general population.
Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
Re: "lurch to the right"
The Brexit vote seemed to me like people suddenly getting a chance to say "none of that" when they've wanted for years to say "less of that" but that option wasn't on the ballot paper.
The far right are deeply unattractive. But if you believe in a left-to-right spectrum of opinion with a vaguely normal distribution, there are far more people in the moderate right then the far right.
And if you tell those people for long enough that their concerns (about immigration or political correctness or anything else) make them no different from the far right then they'll end up on the far right.
I agree.
It did not take the World's greatest clairvoyants to see the Brexit and trumps appearing on the horizon, even if most did not predict their success. In the U.K. the public mood had begun to alter significantly when the Tories took charge in 2010 with clegg's help.
All eyes were on Cameron to slow the rate of immigration, as stated in his Election manifesto. He was unable to fulfill this promise, so the ice on which he stood had become dangerously thin by the time his half baked Referendum arrived.
The outcome of that vote was more down to popular discord rather than some sinister rise in fascism fermented by dubious publications.
Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
And if you tell those people for long enough that their concerns (about immigration or political correctness or anything else) make them no different from the far right then they'll end up on the far right.
These concerns don't exist in a vacuum - and given the statistics showing that concern over immigration is often higher in areas with very low levels of immigration, this concern must arise of something other than peoples lived experiences.
Similarly with 'political correctness'.
Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by chris stiles:
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
And if you tell those people for long enough that their concerns (about immigration or political correctness or anything else) make them no different from the far right then they'll end up on the far right.
These concerns don't exist in a vacuum - and given the statistics showing that concern over immigration is often higher in areas with very low levels of immigration, this concern must arise of something other than peoples lived experiences.
Yes, fear of the unknown comes into it for sure. But I live in a town where there are several ethic groups, but they don't mix much. There are big cultural differences which, even with open minded people, are hard to surmount. I have Muslim friends, colleagues and next door neighbours. We get on well, but they never visit my house - three big, over friendly dogs.
Posted by mr cheesy (# 3330) on
:
Of course, I'm a foolish liberal, but this piece by ThinkProcess seems to me to be the best explanation of the current state of the world.
The TL;DR version is "President-elect Donald Trump does not create new realities. He tells lies that are seemingly random, frequently inconsistent, and often plainly ridiculous."
Which is basically what the Daily Mail has been doing for years.
It tries to pretend that it has a unique and interesting view of the world and that the available facts can be rearranged into the image that they are portraying. In reality it is just lies (mixed with half-truths, knee jerk reactions, out of context claims, inane commentary and wolf-whistles the the hard-right) that are seemingly random, inconsistent and plainly ridiculous.
[ 28. November 2016, 07:33: Message edited by: mr cheesy ]
Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
The outcome of that vote was more down to popular discord rather than some sinister rise in fascism fermented by dubious publications.
I would agree that "popular discord" was a significant proportion of the Leave vote - people voting as a protest against the government, without any thought of the issues of EU membership or immigration. Others voted to Leave out of questions of sovereignty, for whom immigration was not an issue.
However, I don't think it can be denied that many people have been convinced that immigration is a problem, rather than the fact that immigration is a benefit to the country. And, a lot of that has been because they've had decades of "newspapers" like the Mail telling them lies about immigrants - including lies that immigrants are taking council houses.
Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
But are there really? Mail readers see themselves as being a cut or two above the red-tops, and the real papers use long complicated words and don't spend so much time on the doings of the Kardashian clan. Unless the UK press has grown considerably in the years since I left, I'm not sure that the selection is as wide as you imply.
"I only read Der Sturmer because of their sports coverage."
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on
:
Confession: I used to read the Telegraph because of the quality of their cricket reporting, and the cryptic crossword. I don't anymore, partly because I didn't have time to actually read the news, and it's an expensive way to get a daily puzzle and a few pages of cricket reporting.
Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on
:
We (post-grads/post-docs) also used to get the Telegraph for the cryptic crossword. Not that we could ever complete the bloody thing.
But the Telegraph is demonstrably of a different nature to the Mail. I'm not going to lump them in together on some false-equivalence.
Posted by hatless (# 3365) on
:
Someone called the a Telegraph crossword the last refuge of a lazy mind. ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
Is it my imagination but is the Torygraph morphing into the Nigel Farage PR man?
Posted by Erroneous Monk (# 10858) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
Someone called the a Telegraph crossword the last refuge of a lazy mind.
I like it because it's do-able while (deceptively) looking as difficult as The Times.
But I don't buy the Telegraph any more. Sigh.
Posted by hatless (# 3365) on
:
I occasionally attempt the Guardian crossword, but mostly it has the effect of making me stare into space for long periods.
Very much like recent politics. I don't know what is going on. I'm not persuaded by most analyses I've seen. I don't know what should be done or where to throw my puny weight.
My most optimistic idea has been that voting has been trivialised by reality show votes and the Internet style of just getting thoughts, likes, downvotes, and so on out there.
I suspect there has been a lot of protest voting, not entirely serious or deeply felt, but expressing negative feelings because you can. Like the poll to name a research ship that came up with Boaty McBoatface. It's a gesture, not a serious attempt to participate in the democratic process.
We were told that many who voted Brexit didn't expect it would be the majority. Probably they voted leave because they expected no change. Yesterday's by-election supports this.
Yes, the Daily Mail is a heap of soul toxins, and I'm sure it has a pernicious influence, but I don't think it has made the nation suddenly full of bigots, any more than Trump will find everyone in tune with his bullying style.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
I thought that Boaty was a kind of piss-take of various pompous farts who abound in public life. Also, it's fun, FFS.
However, Brexit is different, and can't be summarized in one neat theory. It's a move to the right, it's nationalist, it's cocking a snook at politicians, it's a rejection of austerity, it's a fuck off, it's anti-foreigner, blah blah blah.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
The outcome of that vote was more down to popular discord rather than some sinister rise in fascism fermented by dubious publications.
I would agree that "popular discord" was a significant proportion of the Leave vote - people voting as a protest against the government, without any thought of the issues of EU membership or immigration. Others voted to Leave out of questions of sovereignty, for whom immigration was not an issue.
However, I don't think it can be denied that many people have been convinced that immigration is a problem, rather than the fact that immigration is a benefit to the country. And, a lot of that has been because they've had decades of "newspapers" like the Mail telling them lies about immigrants - including lies that immigrants are taking council houses.
Immigration is probably both unavoidable and beneficial. I suppose politicians are bending over to the UKIP position, and thus, are in denial.
I don't see how you can control it, unless you can control labour shortages, but how would you do that? Or there is the fantasy, that local youth will be up at 6am to pick the strawberries. Local farmers deride that one, for one thing, they are too unfit.
I see that plenty of Labour MPs are being very shifty about this, I suppose in fear of their seats in Leave areas.
And, the new UKIP leader wants to dismantle the NHS, so we can see his leanings. To the right.
Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on
:
Seem to remember a phrase from politicking of old called "play the race card", almost as if to do it was some sort of dirty trick, an under hand means of gaining cheap public support.
That has gone out of the window. Trump and Brexit are *Diana style* politics which many predicted would find favour. Throw in Internet echo chambers and you find democratic Swings far different now than those driven by the Daily Rag of yesterday.
© Ship of Fools 2016
UBB.classicTM
6.5.0