The Sun - your super soaraway source for crap propaganda

Years ago, when I had too much hair, wore too much black and listened to too much Nirvana, around about the time of the first Gulf War, my cousin's boyfriend passed me a creased bit of paper that was beginning to fall apart around the folds in it. "Here, Crackers," he said, except he didn't because my name isn't Crackers but you can imagine him saying a real name like Trevor or something, "have a look at this".

They're really not for reporting the news

If there's a central point to this blog, something I constantly bang on about almost to the point of barking it at whoever's sitting next to me on the tube so they clutch their bag a bit tighter and shift their weight in their seat, trying to get as far away as possible without making visual contact with my boggling eyes; it's that papers, especially the tabloids, don't exist to report the news.  They exist to crowbar events into pre-existing narratives and create propaganda by trying to disguise editorial as information.  I bang on about it because it's true.  The voices tell me.

Propaganda frenzy!

OMFG!

Metro front page: Girl of 8 used as 'suicide' bomber
Telegraph: Girl, 8, 'kills Iraqi officer in suicide mission'
Daily Mail: Iraqi insurgents use eight-year-old girl as suicide bomber

An eight year old girl has been used as a suicide bomber in Iraq!

Except no.

Eagle eyed readers will spot this, halfway down the Metro article:

The Americans called it a 'suicide' attack and put the number of injured at seven. Later, they gave the age of the girl as between 16 and 18.

Not eight then. See that headline? That's rubbish, that is.

And a new story about how nasty and barbaric Muslims are enters the current mythology. Hurrah for crap newspapers.

More at The Anti Press.

*UPDATE* And it's gone!
The Metro site is now 'experiencing difficulties', so the link above probably won't work. Possibly because most of the comments on the story pointed out the lying headline and one urged readers to complain to the PCC.

Still there on the Mail and Telegraph websites, which strangely don't mention the actual age of the bomber.

*UPDATE* Nope, it's back
Readers shocked by the honesty shown by the Metro pulling the article will be relieved to know it's still there. The comments are excellent.

CAR PARK ATTENDANTS ARE THE HEART OF BRITAIN

WHILE we're on the subject of propaganda, today's Daily Mail has this 'Revealed: Islamist extremists have penetrated the heart of Britain'.

Apparently:

Islamist extremists have infiltrated Government and key public utilities to pass sensitive information to terrorists, the security services have warned.

If this is the case, why aren't these extremists either sacked or arrested rather than just being the subject of 'warnings'?

The only example the article includes of such an extremist is an NCP car park attendant in Richmond Upon Thames. It misleadingly calls this guy a Traffic Warden to make his position sound a bit more official than it actually is.

The trouble with trying to work out which press stories are propaganda is that you end up looking like a crazy conspiracy theorist - but just think - the best example the paper could come up with of Islamic extremists penetrating the heart of Britain is a car park attendant in Richmond.

Propaganda, or the paper bullshitting again?

DOWNING STREET ECHO?

ONE important effect of what Nick Davies calls 'churnalism' in his excellent 'Flat Earth News' is the press's reliance on official sources for stories.

An important consequence of this is that newspapers are prone to accept propaganda as truth, unquestioningly. Via Obsolete and Big Sticks and Small Carrots, is this from the Sun - 'Spy planes take on Talibrum'. Of course, we're talking about the Sun, so it's just as likely that the paper doesn't care that the story is propaganda as being unwittingly duped.

This smells so much like propaganda, it's making me gag. I'm not sure even the Sun would be stupid enough to run a story bragging about how people are unaware they're being listened to without realising that the minute the story breaks, those people will instantly know.

On top of that, having those people think they're being listened to when they're not would be a pretty good result for the armed forces. And so would having the population at home thinking we've got one over on those stupid Taliban idiots who don't even know they're being spied on.

The 'Brummie accent' thing is just an excellent hook to make sure the Sun publishes the story. Lots of people would instantly spot a hole in a story just boasting about how unaware people are that they're being spied on. Inject a little bit of fearmongering about the people at home and you instantly divert attention away from how shoddy the whole premise looks.

Garry at Big Sticks and Small Carrots had a comment on the story deleted that pointed out how stupid it was to show off that people don't know they're being listened to because that would, you know, give the game away. There has to be some reason the mods didn't want their readers spotting that, eh.

I'm betting this will be a story that ends up in text books about propaganda in a few years' time. Of course, if there's an uproar that leads to an enquiry about how an intelligence operation's cover was blown by the Sun I'll have to eat crow.

I reckon crow will be firmly off the menu.

Swallowed by the Daily Express

Apolgoies for the absence from blogging. After insisting I'd had enough of the Express and the goons in its 'Have Your Say' section, I seem to have become taken over by the urge to bang out replies to some of the articles, like a nutter on a bus - which is entirely in keeping with the reason for this blog's existence. It's meant I haven't been able to post here much, but to be honest, the fun was going out of taking tabloid stories apart anyway. Maybe I'll rediscover my enthusiam later.

Still, I have to admit to finding the whole experience of trying to engage the people there incredibly strange. I've read lots of debate with right-wing loons, and I've engaged in the odd real life discussion, but never to any great depth. I'm not a veteran of getting into tussles with people in their blogs' comments. The closest I've come is in the sometimes surreal discussion it's possible to have with evangelical and fundamentalist Christians. The same deliberate ignoring of arguments is there. The same insistence on arguing against what the person would like to have been said rather than what actually has been said is there. A similar number of logical fallacies are thrown around too, especially the trusty ad-hominem and strawman. (Sounds like the makings of a decent Comic-Book, that). The creation of a weird fantasy world pops up as well.

I can't help but be interested by this. Especially since I started this blog as a kind of space for me to say what I would to tabloid readers if I had the chance.

Of course, I don't actually think I'll change any of the regular posters' minds. Maybe the odd person who stumbles across an article who hasn't made their mind up, but more likely nobody at all. That's not really the point though. It's interesting to see the reaction of people to being told that a story they've just posted an outraged comment about is distorted, or even a lie. Or, at least I thought it would be before I found out that it normally amounts to calling someone a PC idiot and refusing to engage with anything they say, or even read what they've written at all. Exactly like your fundamentalist who wants to know why you're so angry at god.

There have been a couple of highlights though. Steveg has been particularly good value in introducing the techniques of the playground to discussions, refusing first to actually address any of my points because 'they bored him', through calling me names and pointing out how sad and lonely I am to finally telling people not to agree with me because I hadn't addressed the point they'd made once. When in fact I had. Takes you back, eh?

Beyond that, I (among others) managed to get the Online Editor to chip into the discussion on 'Is Islam taking over Europe' after pointing out the shonky propaganda technique of illustrating so many articles on a similar theme with a veiled woman - and using one lit from the bottom like a scary horror film monster in this one.

Bizarrely, he argued that he had originally thought using that picture might:

fuel hatred, distrust and narrow-minded suspicion of Muslims.

He was then won over by the contrary argument that:

that within the context of Georg Gaenswein's warning of "European identity" being at risk from Islam, we needed a strong image - immediately recognisable as Muslim and associated with the loss of identity - to illustrate his, admittedly controversial, point.

So, he decided that it was okay to use the picture even though it might fuel hatred and stuff because it also illustrated European identity being at risk from Islam. Get your head around that one. The reason why the picture might cause hatred and mistrust is the argument that shows why using it is okay. Brainaches!

Of course, this is just the Online Editor showing that he's used a picture that conveys the negative view on purpose. But we knew that anyway.

Another great bit from that discussion is Maggie asking if her comment wasn't PC enough to be printed in a discussion thread where people have called Muslims 'vermin', 'terrorists and scrounging scumbags', say 'Definitely NO NO NO it is not taking over Europe.
IT IS TAKING OVER THE WHOLE WORLD AND FAST' and argue that 'When they walk down our streets they should be shown they are not welcome even if it means us showing our feelings of revulsion'.

Makes you wonder what Maggie must have said if it really wasn't PC enough.

Finally, probably the most bizarre thing is the sight of steveg (again) using the familiar old Islamophibic construct of resisting Muslims being the same as resisting the Nazis:

An example of this scenario happened in Germany before the war. The majority of Germans were decent ordinary people, just like the British at the time. The problem was, when Hitler and the Nazis rose to power and carried out many atrocities to get there, most of the German public remained silent.
[...]
The fact is, these so called silent majority, are repeating how the German population reacted before the war when the Nazi extremist carried out their reign of terror.
Surprisingly, we now have a so called Muslim extremist reign of terror, yet the majority of Muslims remain silent!

This is in a thread on an article using similar propaganda techniques to demonise Muslims that the Nazi press used to demonise Jews (although the Nazi press were far more up front and less subtle, it must be said). Oh the irony!

Anyway, that's where I've been. My last post there is on an article about a poll that shows the majority of British Asians feel British, which uses the headline 'We don't feel British, say Asians'. I realised after posting that that it's the sort of thing I'd usually post here, and the blog is languishing with only my last not-half-as-good-as-I-intended-it-to-be post up top, so I'll endeavour to look at the other papers now.

Cheers!

Campaign of hate

Propaganda is the deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate cognitions, and direct behaviour to achieve a response that furthers the desired intent of the propagandist. - Garth S. Jowett, Victoria O'Donnell - Propaganda and Persuasion.

This is just the latest in a very long line of anti-Muslim headlines in the Express. Like many of the others, its worthiness of a front page scream headline is dubious, and like most (if not all) of the others, it uses dodgy techniques to further demonise Muslims.

Before I go any further, I should probably point out that the twats who were sent down should have been sent down. Incitement to murder - it's not big, and it's not clever. I'm not defending those buffons, nor am I defending the goons in the picture.

What I do want to do is quickly point out the shoddy techniques the Express uses here. Firstly, note the use of the term 'these Muslims'. That could mean one of two things - these Muslims here in this article, or Muslims generally. Three guesses as to which one the Express expects its readers to go away with, and three more as to which one it'll pretend it's using if there are any complaints.

Next, there's the use of 'our hospitality'. These Muslims are not us. And 'we're' offering hospitality. Muslims are somehow receiving hospitality from the paper that does little but smear and lie about them. They should be grateful for that, apparently. The article goes further, acting incredulous that 'these Muslims' should have "poured scorn on the nation that guarantees their freedoms," as if this paper doesn't lament the fact that their freedoms are granted every sodding week. And as if it's impossible that any of these people are actually citizens protesting about the running of their own country.

The article uses the old familiar dehumanising techniques - they're 'swarming' apparently.

Is this really worthy of a front page? Sure, the story's newsworthy - but a front page? Forty people at a demonstration? A number that represents a quarter of one hundredth of one percent of the Muslim population of the UK? A number that represents a fraction of the number of Muslims who support the police enough to actually be police officers? (There are an estimated 300 Muslim police officers in the UK. More than seven times the number of protesters here).

Dodgy headlines and negative articles

Back in October 2006, the paper kicked off a campaign to ban the veil. Taking 6 October 2006 as an arbitrary starting point, there have been at least 22 Express front pages with negative headlines about Muslims (there are 21 on MailWatch. Since the collection is incomplete, there could well be more).

Of those, two are just calls to ban the veil, and five are about the failed attacks of a few weeks ago, and one deals with the shonky claims about the plot to behead a Muslim soldier. That leaves thirteen negative stories about Muslims. All but one of those thirteen are false, or head misleading articles.

Over the same time period, there are around 109 articles that show up in a search for the word 'Muslim' on the Express website. Of those, about 11 are either positive or neutral. That leaves 98 negative articles about Muslims, including the 21 that made the front page.

Here are three randomly chosen front page ones:

16 October 2006: 'The veil is banned in hospitals'. Not true. One medical school had stopped female students from wearing veils when they had contact with patients.

30 November 2006: 'Muslim law reaches Britain'. Not true. Some cases can be arbitrated outside court if both parties agree to be bound by the decision of a third party. While this article was about the case of some teenagers who'd attacked another kid and had been ordered to pay compensation by the arbitrator (after the kid didn't press charges officially), it included gems like, "The hardline Islamic law allows people to be stoned to death, beheaded or have their limbs amputated." In Britain? Me arse it does!

7 May 2007: 'At last the veil banned in class'. Not true. Lord Falconer said headteachers could stop pupils wearing veils if they wanted. That's all.

The headlines tend to fall into two broad categories - ones that are designed to rally support for banning veils, commonly employing the 'bandwagon' propaganda technique, pretending loads and loads of people want it - and ones that are designed to highlight the supposed liberties they're taking and extra consideration Muslims want.

Some of the articles themselves go on to withdraw the nonsense statement of the headline, like the three above. Others go on to further demonise and distort in the body of the article. The front page of the arbitrarily chosen start date, 6 October 2006, is 'Riots over Mosque on Queen's doorstep'. It covers the same story I examined the Sun and Mail coverage of in 'Firebobmed Muslims 'asking for it''.

At the time, I was hacked off because the Mail had seemed to take a case of Muslims being attacked and twist it until the Muslims were the attackers. I wouldn't have been as hacked off if I'd seen the Express coverage at that point. It opens describing the clashes as happening between 'race hate thugs', depicting the people the Sun had regarded as victims as race hate thugs from the outset. The Mail at least left things ambiguous, and only implid things to make readers draw their own conclusions.

The Mail completely uncritically quotes locals who claimed that three young men had been attacked, by men coming out of the prayer room with pitchforks, baseball bats and iron bars, 'Whether [...] provoked or not I don't know.' This was after reporting:

There was an altercation between a teenage boy and dairy staff during prayers. It escalated and the windows of several vehicles were smashed.

Amid claims that the boy, his mother and teenage sister were assaulted, up to 50 young people clashed on Tuesday night.

That was bad enough. But note the qualifiers in there. It's only 'claimed' that the mother and daughter were attacked. The claim that the attacks might have been unprovoked are attributed to a witness, and not in the words pf the paper. There's doubt in the Mail's version, even if it is minimised.

Here's how the Express covered the same incident:

The outbreak of disorder began after a mother and her daughter were set upon by a gang of 20 Asian youths armed with baseball bats, iron bars and pitchforks.

The shaven-headed thugs – all dressed in white robes – launched the attack after pouring out of a former office building which is being used as an unofficial mosque.

They attacked Karen Hayes, 46, and her 18-year-old daughter Emily before turning their weapons on the teenager's car. The pair had gone to help after Karen's 15-year-old son Sean and a friend were beaten up by the gang. Police have said it is unlikely the mob will be brought to justice.

Never thought you'd ever see the day when Daily Mail coverage of anything seemed balanced, eh?

Another of the Express distortions I covered at the time was 'Surge in Muslim youth who want Islamic rule', which I looked at in 'Eat your greens or MULTICULTURALISM will get you'. Quote from my post:

The Express article probably warrants most scrutiny. The second sentence includes an outright lie. It says:

"Three-quarters of Muslims aged 16-24 believe women should be forced to wear veils or headscarves [...]"

The study does not say that at all. It says:

"74% of 16-24 year olds would prefer Muslim women to choose to wear the veil, compared to only 28% of 55+ year olds."

Spot the difference. 'Would prefer someone to choose' is not the same as 'should be forced'. Before I met my girlfriend, I would have preferred the women I fancied to choose to sleep with me. I didn't want them to be forced to. That's the difference between an ordinary bloke and a rapist. Plus, the study specifies 'Muslim women' and the Express does not.

Also notable is 'Now Muslims tell us how to run our schools', which prompted me to complain to the PCC. The Muslim Council of Britain complained at the time too, and although the PCC agreed that the article was misleading, it ruled only that the MCB should have a letter published, which it declined.

When I complained, the article's online version was headlined 'Muslims: Ban un-Islamic schools'. One of the elements of my complaint was that the MCB report the article was supposed to be about didn't actually say anything about un-Islamic schools, let alone that they should be banned.

I also complained that the term 'un-Islamic schools' could be misleading, and lead people to believe the MCB wanted to ban non-Islamic schools. Since my complaint (not sure if it's since the PCC's ruling) a second version of the article has appeared on the Express website, which I've just discovered. The headline? 'Muslims: ban non-Islamic schools'.

There's also a quote box directly attributing a quote to the MCB that didn't appear anywhere in their report at all. It says '"Swimming should be banned during Ramadan" - Muslim Council of Britain.' One of the specific complaints of the MCB is that the article erroneously gave the impression that they wanted to ban swimming. Now there's a new online version of the article with that specifically in a quote box.

Special treatment of Muslim symbols

Muslims also appear in a subcategory of articles that has appeared in pretty much all the tabloids recently - stories about how Christian symbols have been 'banned' while Muslim scarves are allowed. There are three notable recent cases - the Nadia Ewedia case, in which she was allowed to wear a cross, but had to cover it - one where schools had 'banned' crosses, in which crosses hadn't been banned but left out of Council literature explaining what religious symbols were since the Council assumed headteachers would know what crosses were - and the recent 'silver ring thing' flap, in which rings were disallowed jewellery in a school because they're not recognised Christian symbols. Crosses were permitted, however. A scarf isn't even jewellery and wouldn't have been included in the same rules anyway.

Pictures of Muslims in negative articles not about Muslims

Muslims pop up in stories that aren't about Muslims or religion at all. The Express has a habit of using their pictures in other negative articles too. Who said the paper wasn't inclusive!

Back in the article where the Express slipped over into racism, 'Ethnic baby boom 'crisis'', the paper exaggerated the content of a Council report, pretending it had characterised a large number of ethnic minority births as a crisis, and pretending it said that there were racial tensions about to bubble over into full scale rioting in Sheffield at any minute. It said nothing of the sort. The paper also used a picture of people in a niqab (that looks decidedly dodgy, as if the paper used a couple of staffers in the car park) to illustrate the article.

Another article from around the same time 'Is the scale of immigration changing Britain for the worse?' (as if the conclusion to that question wasn't foregone) is illustrated by the familiar 'two fingered salute' picture of veiled Muslims.

The article 'Schools where children don't speak English' lied about the number of Britain's biggest cities had over half of their school pupils speaking English as a second language (Express says 'many', real figures say 'none'). It also used a picture of veiled Muslim girls to illustrate it. Muslim girls facing away from the camera, so you can't see their faces.

Results

The campaign is working too. Check out the responses to the article I opened by talking about.

"All, the BNP have done so far is break a few sculls unlike your Muslim brothers who have already signalled their deadly intent, as we know to our cost."

"my sons a copper why the hell should they have to put with the shit these people seem to dish at us in our own country bring in BNP and i think alot of these silly bastards will take a hike we dont want you. get it through its an enlish country and Christian not muslim"

This is ENLAND goddammit! We're ENLISH!

"Muslims are growing in strength both in Britain and throughout the whole of the Christian world, and as they grow they are becoming more defiant, agressive and demanding. They are a clever (crafty) and deceitful race who on the one hand are constantly protesting that all Islamic people are both peaceful, loving, law abiding peoples but on the other hand are preparing to stab us all in the back!"

One of the things I mentioned in my complaint to the PCC is that this kind of article can whip up negative feeling in two very violent minorities. Violent extremist Muslims on the one hand, and far right nutters on the other. Exaggerating how much British society in general marginalises and vilifies Muslims on the one hand, and demonising Muslims as 'race hate thugs' to the other race hate thugs on the other.

Here's the question. Is the Express deliberately trying to disseminate this kind of hate, or is it merely pandering to it to make money? What behaviour is the paper trying to illicit with its campaign? Hatred of Muslims, or just the urge to buy the paper in people who already hate them?

Either way, it's a despicable, hate filled bogroll of a paper.

More soaraway propaganda

Just over a year ago, I made my first foray into the pages of the Sun, since a headline I'd seen on the front of someone else's copy on the tube had me involuntarily stuffing my tongue behind my bottom lip and fighting the urge to make decidedly un-PC noises toward the paper's reader.

The headline was 'UP YOURS', and I covered the story it referred to in 'Super soaraway ARSEPAPER!' - a headline of mine that went on to spawn many embarrassing variations. The jist of the Sun article was that PC killjoys want to stop people flying the St George Cross during the World Cup so as not to offend Muslims. It followed the familiar Sun template of saying that something is being done for one reason, providing examples of people doing it for other reasons, and claiming them as evidence that people are doing things for their original reason. None of the people in the article had actually been banned from flying the flag because of Muslims. The paper followed that up with it's brain-rottingly stupid 'Kick 'em in the baubles campaign', which was another attempt to get people to do what they'd be doing anyway by pretending PC killjoys wanted to stop them. It used the same blame template too.

Today, there's an eerily similar headline. 'FLY IT IN THE FACE OF TERROR' is superimposed over a picture of the Union Flag, and the headline of the online version of the story is 'PM: Fly flag on every building'.

Both headlines are utter rubbish. They're big pants with cack in them. Fly the flag in the face of terror? Never mind that terror is an abstract noun - does the Sun think that last weekend's Keystone Terrorists targeted Tiger Tiger and Glasgow airport because they were the last two buildings in the UK flying Union Flags? Or the last two not flying them? Maybe I've got it all wrong and the paper's just got its Terrys and Trevors mixed up. I dunno.

Still, what kind of rubbish nonsense is that? What could flying a Union Jack possibly do either way to 'terror'? What are terrorists supposed to do, give up because they see some bits of magic cloth? The tabloids seem to love attributing supernatural status to material, but does the paper really imagine terror cells dropping to their knees and repenting because some shovel headed goons have sent off to the Sun for a piece of crap they can attach to their windows? Actually, no. The call to fly the flag serves a definite purpose that has bog all to do with terrorism, but I'll get back to that in a bit.

The second headline, 'PM: Fly flag on every building' is also nonsense - despite being a better illustration of Charlie Brooker's point that Sun headlines sound like Red Injun speech from old westerns. It's followed up by this opening sentence:

GORDON Brown last night staged a show of defiance against terrorist killers by ordering ALL government buildings to hoist the British flag. [Emphasis most definitely not mine]

No he didn't. This is just made up nonsense. We get a clue as to where the paper gets this ridiculous idea a bit later, when it says:

In a document titled The Governance of Britain, he told MPs [yadda yadda yadda]

Here's 'The Governance of Britain'. To save you the trouble of looking through it, I'll tell you that it doesn't mention terror, terrorism or terrorists in connection with flying the Union Flag. Nor does it order ALL government buildings to hoist the British flag. It says instead that the PM will consult over the possibility of relaxing restrictions so that government buildings will be able to fly the flag every day if the people inside them want to. But not in Northern Ireland.

I won't make too much mention of the extensive use of crap photoshop mock-ups of what buildings might look like if they had ridiculously out of proportion flags hanging from them that the paper includes because the it knows its readers are too thick to work it out for themselves. I'm busy trying to erase them from my memory. Still, look at the size of the ones hanging from the Blackpool Tower and Edinburgh Castle. How the fuck would there ever be strong enough winds to make monsters like that wave? Or flagpoles strong enough to hold them for very long if they did? Spacks.

Now, I promised a reason for why the Sun's banging on about waving the flag (again) and here it is. Drumroll please. It's for propaganda purposes. It shouldn't take a genius to work that out. There's even a specific category of propaganda referred to as Flag Waving - although it's usually a bit more subtle than this. Here's the Wikipedia definition of Flag Waving:

An attempt to justify an action on the grounds that doing so will make one more patriotic, or in some way benefit a group, country, or idea. The feeling of patriotism which this technique attempts to inspire may not necessarily diminish or entirely omit one's capability for rational examination of the matter in question.

Most examples of flag waving are not as literal as this, with the use patriotic language or other symbolism to imply that opponents are actually being unpatriotic. Here, the Sun is literally telling us to wave flags, and telling us that we must do it as a show of defiance against terrorist killers. Who wouldn't want to defy terrorist killers? Enough to make it necessary to mark ourselves out if we do?

This is where there is a difference between the 'Kick 'em in the baulbles' campaign and 'UP YOURS'. Whereas the first two called for people to do things they'd do anyway in defiance of non-existent PC killjoys an order to make the paper's readers scared of anything even slightly left wing, this article is asking readers to do something a bit less common, and for different reasons. What the Sun is doing this for is made clear pretty early in the article, when it says:

But Mr Brown REFUSED to rip up the Human Rights Act despite Britain’s security crisis.

And when the article switches from being about flag waving to how the Human Rights Act is hampering our security services, the link is made pretty clear.

Basically, the paper is co-opting its readers into adopting a viewpoint without ever soliciting it. Like with the George Cross, Christmas decorations and the defiance of PC Killjoys, or with the really crap Saddam Hangman nonsense. What it's doing here is encouraging readers to do something for one reason, while slipping another one under their radar. Now, not only is the paper creating a link between opposing the Human Rights Act and patriotic opposition of terrorist killers, but also setting things up so it can claim that not only are people flying the Union Flag in defiance of terrorists, but because they hate the Human Rights Act as well. And they can claim this about anyone who waves a Union Flag, too.

It's done in such a hamfisted and clumsy way, I despair that anyone will fall for it. Even some of the commenters on the story have seen through it - although that might be more because the paper attributed the order to Gordon Brown rather than anything else.

"Wave flag. Flag wave good. Human Rights Act bad. Wave Sun flag - flag wave good, Human Rights Act bad." There. Just saved the Sun a whole bunch of words that were just cluttering up the page. Not to mention the shit pictures.

Apologies for the light posting recently. Been off on my holidays again.

Super soaraway PROPAGANDA ARSEPAPER! II

More boneheaded propaganda parading as news for the hard of thinking at the Sun in 'Al-Qaeda target Prince Harry'. There's even one of those lame diagrams to show what might happen, which is - and although I had been thinking about moderating my language as some people clearly do read this blog and others do link here, I can't think of a better way to describe it - fucking shit.*

I mean, yes, Prince Harry might just be sticking up out of a tank, and evil Al-Qaeda operatives might decide not to just shoot him but jump all over it to drag him away where they can wait long enough to kill him for our brave boys to come and rescue him like in a war comic.

Alternatively, they might just blow the fucking tank up like in a war.

Sorry. You look at it without swearing.

*If you've got a better description, please add it to the comments section.

Super soaraway PROPAGANDA ARSEPAPER!

I usually moan most here about the Mail. That's only partly because I hate it the most. It's also partly because it has the best searchable website of the tabloids. Where else would you find two versions of the same story that show exactly how exaggerated and distorted one has to be to make it to print?

I do hate it though. I don't like the way it distorts and exaggerates and, well, lies to its readers. And I loathe they way it disguises that as righteous indignation. I feel it insults my intelligence.

But not as much as the Sun does. The Mail might fake outrage by saying something like, 'Now, fury as Councils ban shoes' and if you read the article carefully you'll see that the story isn't about anything happening now, there's no fury and no-one banned shoes.

Reading the Sun, you'll get, 'Look, tits! Shiny! Bingo! Save our shoes! Bikinis, phwooar! Celebrity Shit Yourself star Thingy calls Thinga a Slapper! Poll: Is Thinga a minga?' and your supposed to barely register you've read the nonsense story about shoes. Let alone that it was complete cobblers. (Pun definitely intended).

The website hurts my eyes. I hate the shouty, flashy, shiny, distracting noise of it. I hate the way it slows down my browser with its unneccessary flashiness. I hate the way words get shortened because the paper thinks I'm too thick to understand English. I hate the way they stick up doctored photos of what things might look like if they were different because they think I'm too stupid to imagine it, or too thick to understand what the story means. I mean, for fuck's sake. 'Wayne gets in Roo's who'? I don't need a picture of Wayne Rooney in a top hat and monocle to show me what he might look like if he dressed like a posh person. Posh people don't wear fucking top hats and monocles anyway! What kind of shitty fantasy world from the gorblimey strike a light guv'nor make no mistake not nor nuffin' thirties do they think we live in? They even use the word 'toff' in the caption. Who, anywhere, has said 'toff' since 1937?

By including that picture the paper is saying to its readers, 'Look, you thick spack. People in Who's Who are normally posh and Wayne Rooney isn't. This is what posh people dress like. Wayne Rooney doesn't dress like that because he's not posh. Wouldn't he look silly if he did? You can laugh now.' They might as well just have gone with a picture of Wayne Rooney with his tongue stuffed behind his lip with a caption saying, 'You're too stupid to understand the words. Turn to the pictures of tits, you fucking Benny,' underneath the headline, 'Urrrrlurr! You mong!'

Perhaps most of all, I hate the way the paper pushes stupid propaganda and disguises it as fun. Take the 'Killer Wales armed with bayonet', or this gem from today's edition, 'Your Saddam hangman kit':

To play, simply cut out the bearded mass murderer’s limbs, torso, head and feet and place them near the gallows. Next, choose a phrase about Saddam – we’ve suggested a couple below – and challenge a pal to guess it.

I don't hate it because I think it's sick. I like sick jokes. I hate it because it's rubbish. I hate it because it's a way to try to coerce people into a point of view without actually arguing for it or soliciting it. 'Here's a game and if you don't join in, you're a killjoy leftie and probably a Muslim'. And it's shit! It's just . . . shit!

Look at the report of Saddam's impending execution from yesterday, 'You're well hung now'. Just look at it! Picture of a man in his pants next to some jeering so we don't question the content. Look at the opening sentence:

FREE Iraq rejoiced yesterday after cowardly Saddam Hussein was sentenced to hang for the horror crimes of his past.

Free Iraq? Since when? And check out 'cowardly Saddam' and 'horror crimes'. What the fuck is a horror crime? Do they think we're too stupid to understand what 'horrific' means?

But you're not supposed to question this story. Can't you see there's a pun in the headline? And there he is in his pants! What are you, anti-fun? Ha ha ha! Isn't everything cheery?

In amongst this, the Sun says: 'Stay on guard' because:

EVERY month without a new 7/7 terror strike lulls us into dangerous false security.

Memories have faded so fast that some would rather condemn police for overkill than praise them for trying to protect us.

So the trial of terror plotter Dhiren Barot is a timely wake-up call. [...]

But security chiefs warn there are hundreds more where he came from — and thousands willing to offer support. It is only a matter of time before some succeed.

We cannot afford to drop our guard for an instant.

What would the Sun's version of this World War II poster have on it? Veils? Brown men in crazy beards with starey eyes?

Look at that second line. Some of us condemned police as soon as the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes happened - in the same bloody month as the 7/7 'terror strike'. And we weren't condemning them for overkill. We were condemning them for killing an innocent man because of rank incompetence and then lying about it. But never mind that! Here's a picture of a monkey with a fag in its mouth! Don't you like fun or something?

That monkey picture was in the bloody news section.

So you have a matey matey, let's all have a laugh at the silly pictures atmoshpere that covers some blatant propaganda. That's what I don't like. The ha ha, let's all play a game and look at some tits stuff creates an environment where to question anything is to be a killjoy and a spoilsport. Which is a shame, because when you do question some of it, you can often see it's complete bullshit.

Still, it's kind of off topic, but if there really was a series called Celebrity Shit Yourself, I'd watch it.

News for the terminally slow

I bet you thought that the press of the 21st century was far too sophisticated to try to push clumsy World War II style propaganda, or that today's readers were far too savvy to fall for that kind of shite.

BZZT! WRONG! Here's the Sun with 'Killer Wales armed with bayonet'.