General Election 2017

[Blue & Maroon]

Banning the media from reporting on elections or having political affiliations? f***ing hell man get a grip. They are all very clear on who they support, you dont need a PHD to discern who supports who and social media calls out every article they thibk is bias.

[Heisen]

Even if I voted Conservative I would be embarrassed at the smear campaign the likes of The Sun had launched on Corbyn. People should be presented with the facts, not amateurish cartoons making out the man is a psychopath because it suits his agenda. It's preying on the general low intelligence of a lot of it's readership, and it's outrageous as it actually goes towards swinging the election one way or another. That for me is not democratic.

[Amnesiac]

I've never met anybody who thinks the media is unbiased. I prefer that this country's press makes its political affiliations clear; far better that than government controls forcing the press to be much more insidious about the whole thing. Besides, a freer press is more necessary than ever around an election. Imagine if the UK had its own Le Pen up for election right now and the press was banned from making any comment that may show her to be a worse choice than anyone else. And imagine how useful that sort of law would be to that sort of PM.

Bit of a difference between making your political affiliations clear and a smear campaign against an opposition leader though!

[Sir Bobby]

Amazed that people think the news should be censored. That sounds about as Orwellian as it gets. Perhaps we should only let them use Newspeak too just to make sure everyone understands easily and concisely

[Blue & Maroon]

People gravitate to media that thinks what they think anyway. The people reading The Sun who could be influenced by such a 'smear' were probably going to vote for someone else anyway

[Heisen]

Amazed that people think the news should be censored. That sounds about as Orwellian as it gets. Perhaps we should only let them use Newspeak too just to make sure everyone understands easily and concisely

There is a difference between 'censored' and openly and blatantly engaging in a smear campaign against someone in a matter as important as a General Election.

[Sir Bobby]

Amazed that people think the news should be censored. That sounds about as Orwellian as it gets. Perhaps we should only let them use Newspeak too just to make sure everyone understands easily and concisely

There is a difference between 'censored' and openly and blatantly engaging in a smear campaign against someone in a matter as important as General Election.

Check out the definition of censorship and I think you'll find there isn't. Not to mention there are journalists and media who aren't part of organisations, or share their views from non-conventional media platforms, who have as much sway over the general public as many newspapers. What to do with them? Would the censorship extend to Paul Joseph Watson on YouTube/Facebook? Piers Morgan on Twitter? How about you if you want to go on a tirade on Facebook?

[skalpel]

I've never met anybody who thinks the media is unbiased. I prefer that this country's press makes its political affiliations clear; far better that than government controls forcing the press to be much more insidious about the whole thing. Besides, a freer press is more necessary than ever around an election. Imagine if the UK had its own Le Pen up for election right now and the press was banned from making any comment that may show her to be a worse choice than anyone else. And imagine how useful that sort of law would be to that sort of PM.

Bit of a difference between making your political affiliations clear and a smear campaign against an opposition leader though!

There's no clear way of deciding when a "smear campaign" is taking place. A series of lies printed against the character of a political figure? Well, there are press watchdogs who have even forced the Sun to make front page retractions of lies about Corbyn in the past, we don't live in a **** free-for-all and I'm glad of it, but legislating against press freedom at election time is too far.

[Heisen]

There is a difference between 'censored' and openly and blatantly engaging in a smear campaign against someone in a matter as important as General Election.

Check out the definition of censorship and I think you'll find there isn't. Not to mention there are journalists and media who aren't part of organisations, or share their views from non-conventional media platforms, who have as much sway over the general public as many newspapers. What to do with them? Would the censorship extend to Paul Joseph Watson on YouTube/Facebook? Piers Morgan on Twitter? How about you if you want to go on a tirade on Facebook?

So say tomorrow Rupert Murdoch suddenly decided he hated all immigrants and launched a full scale tirade to oust them, would that be acceptable under the banner of a free press? Or when that power is abused in cases such as Hillsborough where the stigma attached to that single incident still reverberates 30 years later due to the outright lying that was published?

The concept of a free press no longer becomes a concept once that privilege is abused to suit the agenda of whoever runs it. Have your own views and political agenda absolutely, tailor yourself to a specific market and readership, whatever. But I don't personally find it acceptable for any kind of press or media that has such a large influence and readership to outright lie and distort the truth to suit it's own needs. Nor is that acceptable for any Tom, Dick or Harry on the street.

[skalpel]

Amazed that people think the news should be censored. That sounds about as Orwellian as it gets. Perhaps we should only let them use Newspeak too just to make sure everyone understands easily and concisely

[Heisen]

Bit of a difference between making your political affiliations clear and a smear campaign against an opposition leader though!

There's no clear way of deciding when a "smear campaign" is taking place. A series of lies printed against the character of a political figure? Well, there are press watchdogs who have even forced the Sun to make front page retractions of lies about Corbyn in the past, we don't live in a **** free-for-all and I'm glad of it, but legislating against press freedom at election time is too far.

Retractions and apologies are often a case of too little too late, though. Most people in this day and age read something once and that's it, the damage has been done. Look at Hillsborough. You still get a lot of people blaming the fans, and a lot of that is down to that article The Sun printed.

I'm not advocating an Orwellian clamp down on the press forever here. Personally I don't even read newspapers. But surely things like The Sun's front page today for example has to be reigned in.

[Amnesiac]

Bit of a difference between making your political affiliations clear and a smear campaign against an opposition leader though!

There's no clear way of deciding when a "smear campaign" is taking place. A series of lies printed against the character of a political figure? Well, there are press watchdogs who have even forced the Sun to make front page retractions of lies about Corbyn in the past, we don't live in a **** free-for-all and I'm glad of it, but legislating against press freedom at election time is too far.

So say tomorrow Rupert Murdoch suddenly decided he hated all immigrants and launched a full scale tirade to oust them, would that be acceptable under the banner of a free press? Or when that power is abused in cases such as Hillsborough where the stigma attached to that single incident still reverberates 30 years later due to the outright lying that was published?

The concept of a free press no longer becomes a concept once that privilege is abused to suit the agenda of whoever runs it. Have your own views and political agenda absolutely, tailor yourself to a specific market and readership, whatever. But I don't personally find it acceptable for any kind of press or media that has such a large influence and readership to outright lie and distort the truth to suit it's own needs. Nor is that acceptable for any Tom, Dick or Harry on the street.

Heisen beat me to it! But this

[ALF]

The Sun are a disgrace. Their front page tomorrow is ridiculous.

[Ol' Dirty Bas Dost]

I don't think there should be censorship of truth, but the papers generally seem to have an attitude of 'sling mud on front page regardless of evidence, then retract 3 days later on p32'. That's damaging to the public interest because it's politically motivated misinformation, and it should be stopped somehow. I think one regulation that could make a big difference would be requiring papers to clearly label news and editorial, and even keep them in separate parts of the paper, so people can get their news without constantly having their point of view decided for them. Of course the editorial control would remain on which stories to report.

On the Paul Joseph Watson comment - that guy should be censored, as in kicked off Youtube. He's as bad as Anjem Choudary for feeding complete bigoted conspiratorial nonsense to credulous dimwits. We'd all be better off for him not to be part of the discourse.

[Sir Bobby]

Check out the definition of censorship and I think you'll find there isn't. Not to mention there are journalists and media who aren't part of organisations, or share their views from non-conventional media platforms, who have as much sway over the general public as many newspapers. What to do with them? Would the censorship extend to Paul Joseph Watson on YouTube/Facebook? Piers Morgan on Twitter? How about you if you want to go on a tirade on Facebook?

So say tomorrow Rupert Murdoch suddenly decided he hated all immigrants and launched a full scale tirade to oust them, would that be acceptable under the banner of a free press? Or when that power is abused in cases such as Hillsborough where the stigma attached to that single incident still reverberates 30 years later due to the outright lying that was published?

The concept of a free press no longer becomes a concept once that privilege is abused to suit the agenda of whoever runs it. Have your own views and political agenda absolutely, tailor yourself to a specific market and readership, whatever. But I don't personally find it acceptable for any kind of press or media that has such a large influence and readership to outright lie and distort the truth to suit it's own needs. Nor is that acceptable for any Tom, Dick or Harry on the street.

There are laws already in place about lying in the press and perhaps there could be minor tweaking there with increases in punishments or something, I don't know enough about them tbh, but to ban blatant bias is a recipe for disaster. There are so many opportunities for it to go wrong. Not to mention the fact that I trust someone much more when they let me know their bias clearly rather than trying to sneak their opinions to me by pretending they are neutral. There's nothing wrong with taking sides on an issue, a debate, or in an election. If a ban on blatant bias was imposed then subtle bias would take over and is that really any better?

Also I think you implied earlier that newspaper bias is a relatively new thing, but I'd disagree with that given the World War II cartoons that littered newspapers back in the day.

[Heisen]

I don't think there should be censorship of truth, but the papers generally seem to have an attitude of 'sling mud on front page regardless of evidence, then retract 3 days later on p32'. That's damaging to the public interest because it's politically motivated misinformation, and it should be stopped somehow. I think one regulation that could make a big difference would be requiring papers to clearly label news and editorial, and even keep them in separate parts of the paper, so people can get their news without constantly having their point of view decided for them. Of course the editorial control would remain on which stories to report.

On the Paul Joseph Watson comment - that guy should be censored, as in kicked off Youtube. He's as bad as Anjem Choudary for feeding complete bigoted conspiratorial nonsense to credulous dimwits. We'd all be better off for him not to be part of the discourse.

[Heisen]

So say tomorrow Rupert Murdoch suddenly decided he hated all immigrants and launched a full scale tirade to oust them, would that be acceptable under the banner of a free press? Or when that power is abused in cases such as Hillsborough where the stigma attached to that single incident still reverberates 30 years later due to the outright lying that was published?

The concept of a free press no longer becomes a concept once that privilege is abused to suit the agenda of whoever runs it. Have your own views and political agenda absolutely, tailor yourself to a specific market and readership, whatever. But I don't personally find it acceptable for any kind of press or media that has such a large influence and readership to outright lie and distort the truth to suit it's own needs. Nor is that acceptable for any Tom, Dick or Harry on the street.

There are laws already in place about lying in the press and perhaps there could be minor tweaking there with increases in punishments or something, I don't know enough about them tbh, but to ban blatant bias is a recipe for disaster. There are so many opportunities for it to go wrong. Not to mention the fact that I trust someone much more when they let me know their bias clearly rather than trying to sneak their opinions to me by pretending they are neutral. There's nothing wrong with taking sides on an issue, a debate, or in an election. If a ban on blatant bias was imposed then subtle bias would take over and is that really any better?

Also I think you implied earlier that newspaper bias is a relatively new thing, but I'd disagree with that given the World War II cartoons that littered newspapers back in the day.

It has always been a thing of course but that isn't to say there can't be an 'enough is enough' mentality. Also, cartoons poking fun at someone like Hitler to lighten the mood and make him seem less of a threat in times of war are different than them portraying someone like Jeremy Corbyn as a lunatic.

There has to be some middle ground somewhere. If outright censorship isn't an option for the reasons you suggested then more has to be done to reign in the outright lies and **** that they spout that they know full well the average reader will take in and digest as fact. Maybe that says more about the average reader but I don't think that is fair when that average reader then votes based on that bollocks.

[Heisen]

Also we have just proved the 'every argument results in Hitler being brought up' thing as fact

[ALF]

Idiots are easily led. A random moron will see The Sun tomorrow and it will make up his mind to pop in the polling station on the way to the job centre and vote Tory because Corbyn is on the front of the paper in a bin with lots of bold negative statements printed next to him.

[Sir Bobby]

There are laws already in place about lying in the press and perhaps there could be minor tweaking there with increases in punishments or something, I don't know enough about them tbh, but to ban blatant bias is a recipe for disaster. There are so many opportunities for it to go wrong. Not to mention the fact that I trust someone much more when they let me know their bias clearly rather than trying to sneak their opinions to me by pretending they are neutral. There's nothing wrong with taking sides on an issue, a debate, or in an election. If a ban on blatant bias was imposed then subtle bias would take over and is that really any better?

Also I think you implied earlier that newspaper bias is a relatively new thing, but I'd disagree with that given the World War II cartoons that littered newspapers back in the day.

It has always been a thing of course but that isn't to say there can't be an 'enough is enough' mentality. Also, cartoons poking fun at someone like Hitler to lighten the mood and make him seem less of a threat in times of war are different than them portraying someone like Jeremy Corbyn as a lunatic.

There has to be some middle ground somewhere. If outright censorship isn't an option for the reasons you suggested then more has to be done to reign in the outright lies and **** that they spout that they know full well the average reader will take in and digest as fact. Maybe that says more about the average reader but I don't think that is fair when that average reader then votes based on that bollocks.

I actually think ODBD's idea sounds relatively feasible for stopping gutter journalism. The only worry about that is that it could essentially make the opinion pieces even worse, and I imagine the type of people that are more likely to be influenced by such things would be more likely to read those pieces than the more boring news.

The problem essentially comes down to the fact that humans prefer infotainment to information, even if the info contained in the infotainment is nonsense or useless. So until there is a way to encourage infotainment based around genuine information then any change is going to be ultimately ineffective I'd guess.