The First Casualty of Electioneering…

There’s a general election coming. Joy.

The first casualty of war electioneering is innocence the truth.

In the news today was Nigel Farage, the leader of UKIP. Allegedly, he “wants to scrap race discrimination laws”. Nigel says “I didn’t say that, I said…”

You know, I don’t like UKIP. Like many I think that, on the whole, they’re “closet racists”, but what I dislike even more is being lied to. Sadly, when I heard this headline, even before I heard Nigel’s side of the story, I didn’t believe it. I didn’t believe it, because ever since UKIP rose to prominence two years ago, there has been a constant stream of negative press directed at UKIP, much of which, if you’re willing to keep an open mind and look for the truth is twisted representations or wilful misinterpretations of reality.

I don’t like the fact that, in these reports, they don’t play the actual footage, so I can make up my own mind. No, what they do, is feed me a line. Not the same line mind, because it changes slightly with every report. No, they feed me a particular line that really paints UKIP in a bad light, but they deny me access to the truth.

Sometimes, I just want to put my head through a wall.

Let me say it again, in case you missed it the first time: my first reaction was disbelief. That’s right, I no longer believe what I’m told “by the media.”

gasp

Shock! Horror! I don’t just accept what I’m told without question! Who’d have thought it, huh? We live in a country where as many as 25% of people don’t believe that man has landed on the moon, in spite of all the evidence to the contrary!

It’s a common refrain, that “the media are to blame” for the state of politics today. I don’t believe that – I think that politics is in the state it is because of the politicians we have – but I do believe that the media has contributed to the conditions in which politicians operate.

Like many, I’m sick to death of constantly been talked at like I’m an idiot and being shovelled political and personal agendas as “news”. In the late 90’s, people complained that “piracy was killing album sales.” and yet, CD sales picked up after the turn of the millennium. Why? Because the music was JustBetter™. People are turning away from traditional media “because of changing technology”. Yeah. Tell it to my CD collection.

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