When war breaks out among the political class, as it has over Brexit, journalists are bound to get excited. It works the other way, too: excitement among journos puts the wind up the politicos. Accordingly, in recent weeks, their frenzied interaction blew a perfect storm across College Green, the media’s favoured haunt outside the Palace of Westminster. Read the rest of this entry »
Journalists, politicians, academics, and governments all agree that the problem of news manipulation needs to be addressed, even if no one seems to be able to agree on what to call it. The terms ‘fake news’, ‘misinformation’, ‘disinformation’, and ‘propaganda’ are all used interchangeably. Read the rest of this entry »
In the last few months, the Daily Express has been running a ‘Crusade’ (their label) with the banner ‘End This Injustice’. Under this banner they have published a number of accounts from mothers who tell of abuse at the hands of the fathers of their children, and a failure by the Family Court to protect them. Read the rest of this entry »
We have seen a number of reports dealing with the sad story of a young father called Christopher Brown who took his own life by hanging. The reports follow a Coroner’s Inquest into the death and most have similar copy which suggest they are based upon a single syndicated news report. Read the rest of this entry »
The corporate papers demonstrate yet again that they are happy for politicians to have a role in press regulation – so long as they’re from the right party.
Before reacting to the title, please note the following qualifiers. By “real news”, I’m primarily referring to the political journalism of the Western and mainstream conservative press, though, centrist and ostensibly liberal outlets are also implicated when they use the manipulative reporting techniques discussed below. Read the rest of this entry »
The rapid spread of fake news can influence millions of people, impacting elections and financial markets. A study on the impact of fake news on the 2016 US presidential election, for instance, has found that fake news stories about Hillary Clinton was “very strongly linked” to the defection of voters who supported Barack Obama in the previous election. Read the rest of this entry »
In June 2019, Brian Cathcart and Paddy French published a report which accused Andrew Norfolk and The Times of an anti-Muslim bias in its reporting. They mention three articles specifically. Of these, two resulted in complaints to IPSO, both of which were upheld. In the first, Tower Hamlets v The Times, the newspaper was ‘ordered’ to publish a summary of the adjudication. Read the rest of this entry »
In the British press, journalists rarely challenge other journalists about their standards. This approach is not protecting journalism. It is corrupting it.
A brief summary of the 65-page report, which has been researched and written jointly by me and by Paddy French. Read the rest of this entry »
